Do What You Have to Do
by kek123452003
Summary: Sequel to Beautiful
1. Chapter 1

Title: Do What You Have to Do Author: Kelley Rating: PG-13 to R Pairing: J/D, naturally Feedback: Feedback is like a fine wine.Okay, I don't really have anything for that one, just send me some! Disclaimers: I'm a high school senior with no job and low income parents; do you Hollywood bigwigs really want to waste your time on me? Notes: This is the fourth in my "Love" series. It starts off roughly a month after, "Beautiful". For those of you too lazy to go back and read the other three stories, here's the breakdown: Donna got sick, Josh fell for Donna, Donna had a daughter before she joined the campaign, Donna gets better, Josh, Donna, and child, [Emma], become a family, Abbey dies, Jed resigns, Josh and Donna get hitched, Josh and Donna have daughter, [Natalie], Josh runs for and wins Senatorial seat, Sam hates Josh because of said campaign, Family moves to Washington with new friends in tow, Josh and Donna have huge fight, and Donna splits town with the girls. If you want anything more in-depth than this, take the time and read the other stories.  
  
March 13, 2005: Thunder Bay, Ontario  
What ravages of sprit conjured this temptuous rage?  
  
Created you a monster, broken by the rules of love.  
  
And fate has led you through it  
  
You do what you have to do.  
  
And fate has led you through it  
  
You do what you have to do.  
  
And I have the sense to recognize, That I don't know how to let you go.  
  
Every moment marked with apparitions on your soul. I'm ever swiftly moving, trying to escape this desire. The yearning to be near you, I do what I have to do. The yearning to be near you, I do what I have to do...  
  
But I have the sense to recognize, That I don't know how to let you go. I don't know how to let you go.  
  
The glowing ember, Burning hot and burning slow. Deep with in I'm shaken, By the violence of existing for only you.  
  
I know I can't be with you, I do what I have to do. I know I can't be with you, I do what I have to do.  
  
But I have the sense to recognize, That I don't know how to let you go. I don't know how to let you go. I don't know how to let you go.  
  
"That was Canada's own, Sarah McLachlan, waking you up this fine morning on." The annoying radio personality's voice was cut off as Donna reached over and slapped the snooze button on the alarm clock. She cracked one of her eyes open and saw that the sun was just starting to rise in the still dark sky. She closed her eyes and rolled back over on her bed, the song's lyrics still reverberating in her mind over and over. "Snap out of it, Donna," she mumbled to herself, burying herself further into the blankets, trying to steal just a little more calm and peace in the early morning.  
  
"Mommy?" a familiar voice whispered from the doorway of the room, foiling Donna's plans.  
  
Donna pulled the blankets back a little and peeked over them to see Emma standing next to her bed her most treasured possession, her stuffed dog Petey, clutched in her hands. "Hey you," she said, her voice a little gravelly from disuse. "What are you doing up so early?"  
  
Emma shrugged. "I woke up and the moon was still out and I couldn't fall back asleep." She jutted out her lower lip in a recognizable fashion. "Can I come in your bed with you?"  
  
Donna smiled and moved over to one side, pushing the blankets back to make room for the child. "Come here, baby," she said, patting down the bed. Emma climbed on up, settling against her mother's side. Donna reached over to wrap an arm around her and snuggled her closer to her. "This is nice," she commented, kissing Emma's head. "Here in the morning, all quiet. Just you and me." Of course, the toddler in the crib across the room chose now to make her presence known. "And your sister." Donna giggled as she untangled herself from Emma, pushed aside the blankets and got out of bed, going over to the crib and picking up Natalie. Quickly changing her diaper, she brought her back over to the bed and climbed back in, settling the baby in between herself and Emma.  
  
"Good morning, Natty," Emma said, leaning over to kiss her little sister's forehead.  
  
"Emmy!" Natalie exclaimed, reaching up and wrapping her little arms around Emma's neck.  
  
"Ah! Attack of the Mutant Baby!" the older girl mocked shouted, flailing her arms about in that over-the-top way that only children can pull off. "Mommy, save me!" Donna laughed quietly and scooped Natalie up in her arms, holding her high above her head, jiggling her a little bit before pulling her back down against her chest and piling kisses all over her face while Emma reached over with Petey, and the stuffed animal pelted her with his own kisses. Natalie squealed and twisted and gurgled with happiness over the attention her mother and sister showered over her. It wasn't something that she was unfamiliar with; in fact, this had been morning ritual for weekend mornings for quite some time. Except for one thing that was missing.  
  
"Where Daddy? Daddy fly!" Natalie asked happily after she'd calmed down, referring to how Josh would run her around the room, over his head like she were flying. She looked up into her mother's warm, blue eyes with such innocence and joy in her brown eyes, Josh's eyes. She didn't have any of the pain or sorrow that Donna knew her own eyes had reflected back in the past few weeks. "Where Daddy?"  
  
"Daddy's not here, Natty," Emma explained for Donna, more than a hint of sadness in her words. "Remember I told you? He's at home and we're here on a little vacation and when we go home, we have all these great stories to tell him."  
  
"When home?"  
  
Emma looked at her mother with a questioning expression, her eyes boring into Donna's with concern and a longing to be at home again. Donna could only rub Natalie's back and look down at the bedspread. "I don't know," the older girl whispered to the now quiet toddler. Almost being able to see Emma's sadness, Donna reached over and pulled Emma into her arms.  
  
"Oh I'm so sorry, Emma," Donna said, hugging both girls to her. She felt the tears start sliding down her cheeks yet again and she wondered if she would ever stop crying or if she would eventually just dissolve into one giant puddle of water. "I didn't mean for you girls to get--"  
  
The door burst open and a middle-aged woman in exercise clothes stepped into the room without preamble. "Hello darlings! Rise and shine, face the day head on." The woman stopped mid-rant when she saw the scene before her of Donna crying, Emma clinging to her, and Natalie quietly playing with blankets. "Am I interrupting something?"  
  
Donna sniffed and furiously wiped at her eyes. "Yes Catherine," she replied tersely. "As a matter of fact you were. Don't you ever hear of knocking?"  
  
"Don't you ever hear that this is my house and I'll barge in any room I damn well please?" The plucky Brit shot back with a wink and Donna had to laugh a little despite her earlier gloom.  
  
Instinctively, Emma covered up her ears. "Grown up word! Grown up word!" Catherine reached her hand across the bed and pulled Emma up and onto the floor. "If you think that's a grown up word, princess, wait until I get through with you. Now come on, both of you scatter so your mummy can get some much needed beauty rest." Donna nodded and kissed each girl on the head, trying extra hard to pour a little bit more love into Emma's kiss. Catherine plucked Natalie off the bed and into her arms. She herded both girls to the door before she turned back to Donna who had collapsed back against the bed. "Oh darling, I almost forgot. My offspring called to inform me that she'd be arriving her this afternoon. Make sure you're presentable," she told her flippantly.  
  
Donna shot up from her bed like a rocket. "What the hell.?" she cried looking at Catherine incredulously. "You mean Lily's coming here today?"  
  
"That's what I just said isn't it?"  
  
"Really?" Emma asked, her face lighting up. "Lily's going to be here soon?"  
  
Donna got up and took Natalie out of Catherine's arms, setting her on the floor on her feet. "Emma, take your sister and go sit in the kitchen," Donna instructed. "Don't try to get any food yourself. Ask Maria to make you something," she added, referring to the housekeeper.  
  
"Oh and Emma," Catherine interjected. She kneeled down to the girl's height and quietly whispered in her ear, "There's a glass with some brown liquid called Jack Daniels in it on the counter. Don't touch it, it's me morning pick me up." She ruffled Emma's hair a bit too much and pushed her and Natalie out the door. "Now scoot you little buggers!"  
  
Once they were alone, Donna turned back to Catherine. "What do you mean Lily's coming today? I thought you said you'd respect my privacy and you wouldn't tell anyone we were here?"  
  
"I do respect your privacy, darling," Catherine fussed, taking Donna's arm and forcibly leading her back into the bed. "But I also want you and your children out of house by next week and I figured that Lily could talk some sense into you."  
  
"You don't want us staying here? Than why--?"  
  
"Oh it's not that," Catherine interrupted pushing Donna onto the bed and pulling the covers around her. "I love you and those girls. I just have a gentleman friend coming up next Monday and since I only see him once or twice a year, we usually spend all our time in the house screwing each other like bunny rabbits." Donna's face visibly blanched at the mental image that presented and shook herself of the thoughts. "Now you go back to sleep and I'll go do my daily exercise regime."  
  
"You have a daily exercise regime?" Donna asked disbelievingly.  
  
"Of course I do. You've seen it." "I've seen you use a Thigh Master for five minutes while chain smoking Virginia Slims."  
  
"And aren't I a sexy little bitch," Catherine replied cattily while rubbing her slightly overweight stomach before getting up and going for the door. "Now if you'll excuse me, I'm gonna go work on my thighs while my maid fill up those little girls' tummies."  
  
"Oh Catherine," Donna called out when she'd reached the door. "You're almost out of the whole wheat bread I bought the other day so just have Maria give the girls some yogurt and fruit for breakfast."  
  
Catherine looked at her oddly. "Why do you do that? I've wondered that since you've been here. Feed them berries and twigs and god knows what else instead of normal food like Poptarts and Cocoa Krispies?"  
  
"Because the berries and twigs are good for them and what you would feed them would help to clog their arteries and put them at a higher risk for heart failure in adulthood," she said as if explaining it to a small child.  
  
"Well that is just bloody ridiculous," Catherine disagreed, shaking her head. "The young ones, they need the sugar in their systems and they can't get it from that garbage you shovel down their throats."  
  
"Why do they need refined sugar coursing through veins?" Donna asked, propping her head up and smiling a little.  
  
"Because if they don't get the sugar, they don't run around like little wildebeests, which means they don't get tired as easily, which means you have to slip a little something from Rip Van Winkle into the bedtime drink to keep 'em down all night instead of saving it for yourself," Catherine said as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. She shook her head as she left the room, shutting the door behind her. "Damn Yankees," Donna heard her mutter under her breath.  
  
"Catherine Irving, the twenty-first century's answer to Dr. Spock," Donna said to herself with a roll of her eyes as she fell back against the pillows of the luxurious king-sized bed that had been hers for nearly a month, since she and the girls had made their way to Canada. The night they had left DC, they'd boarded an early flight that took them to St. Paul, Minnesota. First thinking she'd go to her grandmother's home in Madison, Donna realized that wouldn't work, considering her grandmother was out of the country until April and people would expect her to go there. But they wouldn't expect her to go to Catherine's.  
  
Catherine Irving was the owner of a hugely successful chain of family-style resort hotels that had stemmed from her first project, a small B&B in Madison Wisconsin. She was fifty-eight, beautiful, intelligent, loving, drunk, and eccentric most of the time but she had the money to back it up, and most importantly she was the mother of Donna's best friend, Lily Irving. That was how Donna had come to know her nearly twenty-five years earlier. She and Lily had moved to Madison after Catherine and Lily's father, Charles, had divorced. Donna and Lily had become joined at the hip almost immediately, thereby guaranteeing that Lily and Catherine were included in nearly every family function. Catherine was like the kooky, fun aunt that made your parents seem boring and the Moss children had adored her in their youth and so did their mother, who considered Catherine a good friend. But after their mother died, they'd all clung to their grandmother in support, almost afraid that if they relied on Catherine for the support she'd have so readily given it would be sort of like she was replacing Toni in some way and none of them were ready for that. So after they'd all moved into their adult lives, they'd lost touch with her but when Donna called her from a snowy airport across the border, that day Catherine had put her life on hold and taken Donna and her family in, putting them up at her vacation house in Canada. Which is where they still found themselves, repeating every day as if it were the one before it. They didn't leave the grounds of the spacious home except to venture into town every once in awhile. They didn't talk with any neighbors or go outside much. And they certainly didn't call anyone, especially Josh.  
  
'I wonder what he's doing now,' she thought to herself as she tossed and turned to try to get comfortable. She'd battled insomnia since she got to the house and had found herself starting to sleep past eight o'clock, something unheard of for her. It was just at night, she couldn't help but think about her estranged husband. Was he eating right? Was he working too hard? Was he trying to find them right now at this very moment? 'No, no, and of course,' Donna answered herself as she tried to relax. She thought about Josh at least once every moment of every day. Sometimes she would get angry thinking about him, about what he had said to her that night and then how he'd just walked away. But then the reasonable part of her brain would remind her that she'd basically done the same thing, only much worse; at least Josh hadn't stolen her children away from her. She knew it was a cruel thing to do to him but she needed her girls like she need oxygen. She couldn't imagine being away from them, especially in the state she'd been in. It would have killed her to be away from them. And if she were completely honest with herself, a very, very small petty part of her had wanted to punish Josh on some level for what he'd done. But now she wanted nothing more than to go back to him. Yet something still held her back.  
  
She couldn't pinpoint it or describe it but every time she picked up the phone, ready to call Josh, and tell him they were coming home, a part of her wouldn't let her finish dialing her phone number. It was like an invisible rope just kept pulling her back whenever she felt like she couldn't take it anymore, couldn't take not being with him. It was killing her and even worse she could see it was hurting the girls as well. There wasn't a day that went by that they didn't ask when they could go home to Daddy. And the only thing Donna could tell them was that they'd go home when they were ready to. Which she knew would need to be soon. She couldn't keep Emma out of school forever, no matter how smart she was, and she did miss her family and friends back in Washington. Add to the fact that Emma was throwing daily temper tantrums about not being at home and with Josh, and Donna should have had them on flight back to DC at least two weeks ago.  
  
Not that Donna was completely wrapped up in her own problems she denied her daughter's emotional needs. Donna had brought her laptop with her and Emma was allowed to email Josh once every few days. Just short notes, telling him that she and Natalie were fine. Donna knew Josh had buddies in the fields of intelligence gathering so she made sure to have the IP address changed so Josh couldn't trace it to her computer nor was Emma allowed to tell Josh where they were or who they were with. It sounded ridiculous, even in Donna's mind, but she felt it had to be done. Knowing how fragile Josh's emotional state probably was right now, she didn't want to risk him finding them out of fear of what either of them would do. She wasn't afraid of him per say but rather what his reaction to her would be. Selfish, she knew, but that was what her life had become. Yet despite her fears and insecurities, she still wanted to go back to him, wanted it more than anything.  
  
But there was just this nagging feeling inside of her that kept persisting, no matter how much she tried to ignore it. 'But what is it? What's holding me back?' she thought helplessly as she continued to toss and turn until she fell into a restless sleep.  
  
When she woke up a few hours later, the sun was shining brightly into her room signaling that she'd slept much later than she'd wanted to. She got up, rubbing the sleep from her eyes, and went into the bathroom in her room to shower. When she emerged, she dressed and wandered from her room to downstairs. Going left at the bottom of the stairs to go into the kitchen, she had the uneasy feeling of being watched by someone. Turning slowly, she found herself meeting the gaze of her best friend, who was sitting perched on an armchair in the living room and looked none to happy to see her at the moment. "Hey Lily," she said weakly. No response from Lily, other than a cold, blank stare. "So.what's up? Obligatory yearly visit with your mom?" Still nothing. "Look Lily, if you're going to lay it into me, can you just do it now and cut the bull." Without warning, Lily got up, strode over to where Donna was and wrapped her arms around her in a comforting embrace. Donna didn't do anything for a moment, more out of shock than anything, before she reached up and wrapped her arms around Lily's waist. They stayed like that for a little while until a voice broke them from the peace of the moment.  
  
"My God, Donna, I knew you and your man were having troubles but I didn't know you were considering playing for the other team," a slightly tipsy Catherine exclaimed from the kitchen as she entered the room.  
  
"Wonderful timing as always, Mother dear," Lily quipped as she broke apart from Donna. "It's almost ten in the morning. Shouldn't you be out by the pool, sexually harassing your gardener?"  
  
"Shouldn't you have come out of my uterus a lot less like your father than you are?" Catherine retorted, scrunching her nose and taking a sip from what looked to be a martini. "What are you gonna do, stand there all day or give your Mummy a kiss?"  
  
"Well I would but I'm afraid to light this anywhere near you," Lily replied, reaching into her pocket and pulling out a cigarette and lighter, waving them around before lighting the cigarette.  
  
"Ha ha ha," Catherine mock laughed. "Your father's subtle, dry humor, of course. Glad to see that despite my best attempts to rid myself of that fiend, he still haunts me through my one and only child." Another sip of the drink as she began heading towards the deck that overlooked the majestic Canadian mountain area. "Well ladies, I see you're about to have a very personal and emotional discussion which we all know requires me to have a lot more alcohol in me than I presently do, so I'm going to get fabulously smashed now and leave you two to your girl talk."  
  
Donna, who had moved further into the living room to avoid any residual crossfire from Lily and Catherine, looked at her watch and then at Catherine. "It's only 9:45 in the morning," she pointed out as Catherine passed her.  
  
"Drunkenness is a marathon, darling, not a sprint," the older woman explained, squeezing Donna's face a little roughly in her hand as she passed.  
  
As Donna and Lily turned back to face each other, Catherine pulled open the sliding door and poked her head in. "Oh and Marissa.Mariah.Margarita, you know the one who works for me. She took your girls into town for some provisions. They'll be back soon. Have fun, sweethearts." With that, she pulled open the sliding door and practically stumbled on to the deck, leaving the two women alone in the room once again.  
  
"So," Donna started awkwardly. "How have you been?"  
  
"Well," Lily began, taking a drag from her cigarette, "I was a hell of lot better last night until Catherine called me and told me that you and the girls were here, alone, and that you wouldn't say why. Which was a bit of a relief, actually, because I've been bombarded by phone calls from your family about where you were because according to them, a month ago you ran off with Emma and Natalie after some fight with Josh. And that troubled me because the last time I heard from you, you said everything was going fine in Washington when clearly it wasn't." Another impatient drag. "So that leaves me with just two conclusions: you were either abducted by aliens and replaced by a pod person sometime in the last two months or you lied to me and everyone else around you."  
  
"Yes Lily, thank you so much for your support and caring during what is arguably the lowest point in my life," Donna shot back sarcastically. "I've been fine by the way, being away from my husband and taking my daughters away from their lives!"  
  
"Alright, alright cool down," Lily said, holding her arms up in a sign of defense. She motioned to the couch for them to sit down. Once they were settled next to each other, Lily placed her free hand on Donna's shoulder. "So how you been?" Not saying anything, Donna eyed the cigarette trapped in between Lily's fingers and with catlike quickness, reached out to grab it. But Lily was always protective when it came to two things: her friends and her cigarettes. "Hey, hey," she scolded, batting Donna's hand away. "Bad enough one of us is going to die from throat cancer, it might as well be the one without children." She extinguished the cigarette in a nearby ashtray. "So seriously, what happened with you and Josh?"  
  
"I'd tell you if I knew, Lily," she replied quietly. "But I just don't know what went wrong."  
  
Lily sighed in frustration. "Oh please, kill the dramatics--"  
  
"It's not dramatics, it's the truth," Donna disagreed angrily before Lily could finish. "I don't know what happened. I don't which one of us changed or what led up to it or even if we can fix it! I just don't know anymore!"  
  
"Okay, I'm sorry," Lily apologized hastily, in an effort to keep her friend from going over the edge. "I'm sorry. I just.had no idea that things were going badly for you guys."  
  
"They weren't. I mean it wasn't like we were screaming at each other everyday or he was hitting the girls or me. It just kept building little by little and then it got to a point where I couldn't take it anymore."  
  
"Take what?"  
  
"Everything." Donna went on to spend the next hour telling Lily about the horrible fight she and Josh had had. About how he'd left and about the desperation she'd felt. About taking Emma and Natalie and putting all three of them on a plane to a city where she didn't know anyone with very little money. And finally about coming to Catherine's and basically hiding out ever since.  
  
"So let me get this straight," Lily finally asked. "You left Josh a month ago with his children and you haven't tried to call him or see him to tell him you're all safe since? And you only let Emma email him in a way in which he can't find you? And you yourself still haven't contacted him at all? Or anyone for that matter?"  
  
"Look, if you're going to say how stupid it was."  
  
"I wasn't," Lily protested. "I mean, it was stupid but that wasn't what I wanted to say. What I wanted to say was I'm really not that surprised, after hearing about it, that you left."  
  
Donna looked at her curiously. "What do you mean?"  
  
"You ran away from the problem, Donna. It's what you always do when you can't control the situation anymore."  
  
"That is just so untrue." Donna denied haughtily, getting up to pace.  
  
"No it is not untrue. You're doing it right now," Lily pointed out, getting mad at Donna and following her. "You're walking away from me because you know I'm right. Anytime you've gotten in over your head with something, you ignore until you can't and then you run away until it gets better. Your parents' fighting, Ben, the anemia; you put everything on a backburner until you couldn't handle it. And you're doing the same thing right now, only this time you're dragging two children along with you who don't deserve be caught up in it! So what was it this time you couldn't handle?"  
  
"Me, Lily! I couldn't handle me this time!" Donna shouted at her, saying out loud what she hadn't said to anyone. Lily just always had a way of getting the truth out of her, even when she didn't want to. "I couldn't handle who I was becoming. This.this woman who lived for the happiness of a man. Because that's what I was doing, living for Josh. Living and dying everyday with his accomplishments and failures. There was nothing in my life that was mine anymore, that I could take pride in for myself, except for the girls. And I couldn't stand it and I didn't know how to change it because it was me who needed to change and I didn't know how to!"  
  
"Because you never have! You're the same person now that you were when we were kids, with a few additions. You never wanted to change because every time something changed in your life when you were young, it hurt you. And you just don't want to get hurt anymore so you run from change and confrontation all the time!"  
  
"So?!" Donna cried, throwing her arms up in frustration. "Is that so bad, to not want to get hurt? To want to prevent it from happening?"  
  
"It wouldn't be if you didn't also prevent yourself from living," Lily said softly, looking her in the eye. Donna stopped her pacing and stared thoughtfully into Lily's wise brown eyes. "And with a limited number of exceptions, that's exactly what you've done."  
  
Donna rubbed her tired eyes and walked back over to the couch, not having the energy to try to argue with Lily about something like that. Instead, she fell back into it in a heap. She stared up at the ceiling fan as if it held the secrets of the universe. Lily joined her after a minute, lying at her side. It was a while before Donna spoke again. "Do you think Josh and I got married too soon? I mean, shouldn't we have done things normally instead of doing it our own way?"  
  
"How do you mean normally?  
  
"Oh come on," Donna scoffed. "I nearly died so Josh proposed to me before we'd even dated or kissed. That's not how the whole engagement process generally goes. Maybe we should have taken the time to get to know each other better and discuss what our plans were."  
  
"So you could have what? Finished each other's sentences within two seconds as opposed to three? Made plans that would've probably gotten changed anyways? That's what engagements are about and you and Josh were doing that for the four years prior to your marriage. Besides, think of it this way: if you hadn't done everything the way you did it, Emma might still be an only child."  
  
"Yeah," Donna whispered her agreement, thinking of what she would do without seeing Natalie's beautiful brown eyes or hearing her voice. "You're right. I just.I've been wracking my brain for the past month to try to figure out a reason for why we're where we are. How it got to where I had to leave."  
  
"Can I make a suggestion?" Lily asked. Donna nodded. "Truthfully, I think it happened before you even met Josh. I think it happened when your dad left."  
  
"What?" a surprised Donna turned to look at Lily, not expecting that one.  
  
"When Evan left," Lily continued, "from that day you devoted yourself completely to everyone you loved, without considering what it would do to you. And you've been that way ever since with everyone you've ever loved. Josh, the girls, your brother and sister, me; you just never know when to stop giving yourself to us. You give so much to us that you lose who you are in the process of being who you are."  
  
"I don't understand," Donna said, even though she was pretty sure she did.  
  
"Yes you do. You understand that you have to change and you don't want to. Why is that?"  
  
"Because."  
  
"Because what, Donna?" Lily urged her.  
  
"What if they don't love me anymore?" Donna admitted quietly. "What if who I am isn't what they want me to be anymore? What if I change so much Josh leaves me behind?"  
  
"You have to risk it," Lily advised. "You have to risk it because if you don't, you'll die. You will suffocate in your hatred of your life and it will kill you." She turned back to look at the ceiling and took Donna's hand in her own. "You know you need to go back, right? If not for your marriage, for the children. They're learning from your examples all the time. Do you want them to learn that it's okay to do this, to run away, every time something hurts them?"  
  
"I can't yet," Donna replied. "I don't why but I don't feel ready yet."  
  
"That's okay," Lily reassured her, squeezing her hand. "I'm not forcing you to go back. What I am going to force you to do is to call your husband."  
  
"Lily." Donna tried to argue with her.  
  
"Donna if you don't, I swear to God I will," Lily vowed seriously. "You don't have to tell him where you are; just tell him that you and the girls are okay. He's probably worried out of his mind by now."  
  
Donna sighed and closed her eyes, feeling a headache coming on. Wanting to talk to Josh was one thing; actually doing it was another thing. She could only imagine how angry he was going to be at her for basically kidnapping their daughters. But Lily was right; she would have been the same way if the tables were turned. "I'll call him tonight, after the girls are asleep," Donna promised. "So he and I can hash it out with minimal psychological damage to them."  
  
"Oh it won't be that bad."  
  
"Really? What makes you think that?"  
  
"Donna, I was sired by the only two people in the world who should have never married, with the exception of the Pope and Marilyn Manson. And I turned out just peachy."  
  
"Oh God. If this is what happened to you as a result of your childhood, I don't want to think about how Emma and Natalie are gonna turn out," Donna teased her.  
  
"So that's how it's gonna be?" Lily laughed, reaching for a throw pillow. She bopped Donna on the head until Donna managed to get a weapon of her own. They giggled and whacked and shrieked for what felt like hours until they heard a car pulling up to the house, signaling the girls' arrival home. Lily halted all action and jumped down off the couch to go greet the children, leaving Donna alone in the living room amid a pile of pillows and couch cushions. The smile faded off her face as her mind went back to the reality that she'd taken a momentary break from.  
  
'I wonder what he's doing right now,' Donna wondered again as she slowly started counting down to their inevitable conversation tonight. 


	2. Chapter 2

March 13, 2005: Washington DC  
  
Several hours later, [and hundreds of miles away], a tired and beleaguered junior Senator from Connecticut was sitting behind his desk staring intently at his computer, a long-since cold cup of coffee beside him, and the bright lights of the city and starlight flickering behind him through his office window. The lights looked almost like tiny fireflies against his computer screen. Thinking of fireflies, of course, led him to think of the Fourth of July at his house in Connecticut last year and watching his oldest daughter chase them all around the yard while his baby daughter had crawled around the grass in a vain attempt to catch up. 'I wonder if that's what they're doing wherever they are right now, chasing fireflies,' Josh thought to himself sadly.  
  
Shaking off those thoughts, he turned back to the computer. He tried with everything in him to concentrate on a proposal he was working on for the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to look at tomorrow, but his heart just wasn't in his work. It hadn't been for a month now. Closing the program, Josh clicked down to his Internet icon and browsed to his email. Typing in his account number, he hit "Enter" and waited for any new messages to come up. After a moment, the "No New Messages" appeared, further sinking Josh's tired heart. No contact from Emma or from Donna on where they were or what they were doing. No contact that would help ease his worried mind a little bit. Nothing that would bring his family just that small fraction closer to him.  
  
"Hey Sue, you leaving for the night?" Josh heard a female voice call from the doorway outside his office that led to his reception area.  
  
The new receptionist in his office, Sue, responded to her company, "Yeah just a second, Hallie. I've got to redo the appointments for tomorrow. What are you doing here so early? I thought Congressman Uley need you tonight?" Their conversation turned to idle office gossip then that Josh didn't care to listen to. After a few moments of listening to mindless dribble, he went up to fully shut the partially closed door when something one of them said caught his attention.  
  
"So how is the great Senator Family-Man doing these days?" Hallie asked Sue sarcastically. Intrigued, Josh paused and pressed his ear closer to the cracked door.  
  
"Don't you mean Senator Career-Minded," Sue scolded her half-heartedly.  
  
"I'm sorry, I'm just so sick of it. These men who come to DC, riding the coattails of being the ideal loving husband and father, yet the minute they step into the Senate chambers they dump their families to the wayside in favor of a seat on a good committee." Josh sucked in a short breath and bit down hard on his lip. 'So everyone really does know,' he thought bitterly.  
  
"You don't know what happened between the Senator and his wife. Hell, most of us here in his office don't know what happened. And why should we?" she asked, her voice taking on an annoyed quality. "I mean our careers only depend on him after all. So a little thing like personal crisis's that affect his job performance shouldn't be any of our concern or anything"  
  
"She just up and left with the kids is what I heard."  
  
"Me too. But does he do anything to try and find them? Does he lift a finger to go after them? No, of course not," she replied in that tone that came over a person when they just knew they were right about someone else. "After all, he can probably spin a divorce come reelection time," he heard Sue say as she put some papers away. He bit down furiously on his lip, using every bit of strength he had in him to keep himself from launching out of the office. "You'll see. He'll just say she was crazy or something, maybe even a prescription drug addict. Probably try to take the kids from her. After all, those photo-ops just aren't complete without the little cherubs standing right beside him."  
  
"You know the older daughter?" Hallie continued glibly. "She isn't even his. The wife had her before she even met him and he had to adopt her to save face for the election." Their voices trailed away as the pair left the room, leaving Josh alone with his anger and humiliation.  
  
'Shouldn't be so surprised,' he thought as he walked back to his desk to gather his things for the night. His energy for work had been instantly zapped away from that little bout of eavesdropping. Not by the fact that members of his staff were questioning his moral credibility but rather that word had spread about his marital woes so quickly. Josh was careful to never publicly talk about his family to begin, lest he rally up the crazies of the world even more. And he knew that those who knew of the separation would not leak the news to anyone they didn't deem trustworthy. But still, this was Washington; secrets don't remain secrets in this town for long, especially personal ones. But Josh had no desire to deal with any of that tonight. So he packed up his things for the night and left, stopping by Security on his way out to alert them that Sue Myers no longer worked for him and to escort her from the building tomorrow morning when she returned.  
  
'That's a little harsh,' his subconscious self said to him. Naturally, his subconscious self had Donna's voice. She'd been his moral compass since he'd met her; even before a personal relationship between them began he would find himself working on a particular bill or budget reports and thinking, 'Would Donna think this was right?' Even now, despite everything, he wondered if she would approve of him firing someone just because of a negative comment they'd made about him. 'But she won't know about it because she took off for God knows where with your kids in tow so you really shouldn't give a damn about what she thinks is right anymore,' he reminded himself angrily, as he did nearly everyday since she'd left.  
  
As he was walking out of the Capitol building to go back to his empty house, a voice called out for him. "Josh, wait a minute!" He turned around to find his friend, Representative Bobby Harrington jogging up to him. "How's it going, man?"  
  
"Hi Bobby," Josh replied, starting to walk again as Bobby trailed after him.  
  
"So," he began conversationally as they walked down the Capitol steps, "what happened today?"  
  
"Nothing much. Gagner wants an amendment added to the--"  
  
"I wasn't talking about work and you know it," Bobby interrupted him.  
  
"I did know it. I was just practicing that famous avoidance behavior of mine."  
  
"Have you heard from--?"  
  
"Have I heard from Donna at all in the past month?" Josh stopped walking and turned to his friend, his frustration over anything consuming him for a moment. "Has she called or written once in the past month to tell me where she is or what is going through her mind right now? Has she called to tell me where my daughters are or that Natalie's learned a new word or that Emma's gotten grounded for hiding her vegetables in potted plants again or anything? No she hasn't and until she does, I'm doing everything humanly possible not to think about my family so I can, just for a few glorious moments, avoid the searing pain that wells up inside of me every time I have to accept that I don't know where the hell my family is!" After getting that out, Josh sucked in a deep breath and continued on his way and it was a moment before Bobby caught up with him.  
  
"Yeah, man, you've got it real rough," he agreed the sarcasm dripping from his voice like syrup.  
  
"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" Josh spat out angrily.  
  
"You're a lot luckier than some folks."  
  
"How do you figure that?"  
  
Bobby paused for effect. "At least you know your girls are still alive," he whispered reverently.  
  
Josh, mollified by that statement, took a deep breath and let it out slowly in an attempt to get his anger to dissipate. When he thought he was under control, he apologized. "Sorry. Kinda got away from me for a minute."  
  
"It's okay." He patted Josh's shoulder. "Listen, what are you doing tonight?"  
  
"Probably just going to work on the language for Gary's bill."  
  
"Why don't you come to the house? Helen would love to have you and you shouldn't be alone like this."  
  
"Bobby, I'm fine. It was a momentary lapse. I'm going to go home and--"  
  
"Stew in an empty house, wandering through every room with a bottle of vodka in your hand all night?"  
  
"No," Josh disagreed. He sighed, glancing at Bobby. "It's usually Scotch." He started walking to where he'd parked his car.  
  
"Okay, here's what we're gonna do." He grabbed Josh's shoulder and steered him to where his own car was waiting. "We're gonna get in my car and you're gonna come over to my house where Helen will saddle you down with enough leftovers to last a week and you'll be surrounded by the living for one night. Then afterwards, we'll pick up your car and I'll take you home and tuck you into bed so you'll be all rested for the morning."  
  
"Gee, thanks Mom," Josh quipped. "But I don't get any dessert?"  
  
"If you're a good boy and eat all of your dinner," Bobby promised him as they climbed into his Mercedes. Unlike some Congressmen and women, Josh and Bobby opted not to have a personal driver, relishing the quiet time they had in the privacy of their automobiles. They settled in and headed off for Bobby's home in Alexandria, conversing on work-related issues rather than personal ones. As soon as they set foot in the house, Josh noticed the stark contrast it held with his own home. His three-story brownstone in Georgetown was so devoid of life and happiness lately. There was virtually no sound whatsoever of family there. But here, one could feel the love that permeated from the walls. Talking and laughing and occasional shouting could be heard from the Harrington family. Bobby's wife Helen, a prominent obstetrician in the area, was on the phone while she was setting the table. Her sons, seven year-old Freddie and eighteen year-old Mike, who was visiting home from the University of North Carolina, were playing video games in the living room, alternately joking with each other one minute and trying to kill each other the next.  
  
"Hey, time out!" Bobby cried out as he approached his sons during one of the fights, separating the shoving individuals.  
  
"But Dad, he's head hunting all my good batters!" Freddie complained of his older brother's methods of playing video baseball.  
  
"Stop crying you little runt," Mike teased him as he demonstrated his techniques.  
  
"Shut up!" he shouted, punching his brother's arm before turning back to his father. "Daddy, he's not playing fair!"  
  
"Daddy, he's not playing fair!" Mike mimicked in a high voice. Freddie lunged for him again but Bobby held him back.  
  
"So that doesn't mean you go off and actually hit him," the father explained patiently to the boy while Mike grinned victoriously. Bobby set the boy down and took the controller from Freddie. "What you do is when you're man's sliding into second, go spikes up so you can take out the baseman."  
  
"Oh Bobby, don't teach him that," Helen reprimanded as she hung up the phone and caught her husband tutoring his sons in the art of poor virtual sportsmanship. "It's bad enough you've got them sitting in front of that things, killing off brain cells by the minute. You've got to teach them how to cheat at the same time?"  
  
"They're gonna learn how to cheat someday, might as well teach them to do it right," Bobby pointed out as he went over to greet his wife with a kiss. Josh's heart clenched at the sight; thinking back to how many times he'd spent evenings like this with Donna and the girls for granted in the past. He was broken out of his reverie when Helen came over to him.  
  
"It's good to see you, Josh," she said quietly as she wrapped him in a quick hug. He returned it. "I'm glad you came tonight."  
  
"Well your husband promised me food that hasn't been in my fridge since February. How could I resist?" he joked, trying to mask his pain a little bit.  
  
Helen looked like she didn't believe him but she let it go. "Well, it's all ready. Come on in," she said, leading him and everyone else into the dining room. They all sat around the table and joined hands to say grace.  
  
"Fredrick, would you do the honors?" Bobby asked his youngest son.  
  
The boy nodded eagerly. "God bless this food we are about to eat and let it strengthen our bodies and minds. Please offer your love and guidance to everyone on Earth. And please take care of my sister Sondra, who's living with you in Heaven. Amen."  
  
"Amen." The Harrington's collectively whispered quietly. Josh had listened to the prayer but chose not to partake in it. Faith was not something he carried in abundance of late. Losing one's entire family without any warning would do that to you. Shaking it off, he reached over for a platter of roast beef when Freddie exclaimed. "Oh no!"  
  
"What is it sweetie?" Helen asked concerned.  
  
"I forgot something during grace. Can I do it again? It'll only take a second." Mike rolled his eyes in annoyance but was kept from opening his mouth by his mother's stern glance. Silently the family joined hands again and Freddie began the prayer once more. "And God, if you can find time for it, between healing people and ending wars and all that, please make it so that Donna, Emma, and Natalie can come home soon so that my Daddy's friend Josh isn't sad anymore. Amen." Everyone nodded their agreement and said "Amen" and turned back to Josh to see what his reaction would be.  
  
Stunned, Josh looked at the little boy sitting next to him and swallowed back some tears. That Freddie and the rest of the Harrington's cared so much about what happened to him meant a lot to him; a lot more than he'd thought it would. Josh reached over and smoothed a hand over Freddie's head while he gave him a small smile. "Amen," he whispered roughly. He smiled sadly at the rest of the table and again reached over to get some roast beef, letting the meal get back on track.  
  
The tone of the meal was a pleasant one. Stories about each others' day were exchanged and plans and schedules for the next day were made. Josh mostly stayed silent, allowing the family to converse without his interference. He was just glad to not be alone in his own house at the moment. No one pressured him to talk, just let him eat his dinner in peace. That is, until Freddie asked him a question.  
  
"Josh?" he asked innocently.  
  
"Yeah Freddie?" he answered as he went to pour himself another glass of water.  
  
"I was talking to some kids at recess today and they wanted to know something about you."  
  
"What's that?"  
  
He looked at Josh seriously. "They were saying that their parents said that you made Emma and her mommy leave because you weren't Emma's real daddy. That's not true is it?"  
  
The whole group was shocked, not that Freddie would say such a thing, but that other parents, adults supposedly, would tell their children such things. Josh, for his part, was feeling a myriad of emotions. Anger, sadness, humiliation; they were all hitting him like a freight train. He didn't say anything, just sat his glass on the table, quietly excused himself, and got up, heading back towards the kitchen. When he was there, he walked to the sink and braced his hands against it, squeezing his eyes shut and taking deep breaths to try and calm himself down before he lost control of his emotions. After a minute, things started shifting back into focus in his mind and he began to calm down. 'If only I'd been this smart that night,' he thought to himself.  
  
After Donna had left and he realized he couldn't find her, one of Josh's first phone calls had been to the San Francisco offices of one Dr. Stanley Keyworth. Considering Josh's mental state and the special relationship the doctor had shared with President Bartlet and his staffers, Dr. Keyworth had flown out and done some intense therapy sessions with Josh in the first few days after Donna left. During that time, Josh took time off for what his office told the press was a "family emergency". At the end of the second week, both Stanley and Josh felt he was on solid mental ground to return to work full-time. Stanley had left Josh with several books on PSTD and it's residual effects and how to control them as best he could. Josh realized that they way he'd taken his anger out on Donna that night was a manifestation of the disease itself. The rage he still carried over the shooting lingered on despite his best efforts and he needed to learn how to keep it in check to avoid it happening again. To do this, Josh had been prescribed the anti-depressant Paxil and was attending therapy sessions with a doctor Stanley recommended. He finally was beginning to accept that he'd never be entirely cured of the PTSD and while troubling, it did help him explain to others why he'd gotten so angry at Donna in the first place over something other people might have been able to work through.  
  
But that still didn't justify her behavior to him, not one bit. She'd gone and taken away the most precious things in his life from him, seemingly without any regard to what it would do to him. He missed Emma and Natalie so much he felt like he'd go crazy with longing for them. Everyday when he got home, after staying as late as he possibly could at the office, he'd go home and look at old home movies of them and photo albums, memorizing each and every moment that had been captured. It was killing him ever so slowly to be away from them like this. The only things that were holding him together at this point were his friends and Emma's emails. "I taught Natalie how to feed the goldfish. We dressed in our bathing suits and played mermaids in the bathtub. Mommy is still sad. We miss you lots." He'd committed every word of every one to memory. They were Josh's lifeline to his daughters and he treasured all of them as if they were gold doubloons.  
  
But something about them troubled him. Emma always made a point of mentioning that Donna was sad. He didn't know if this was due to be away from home or from the stress of their marital problems or if it was from something more serious. Josh wasn't ashamed to admit that he'd wondered often if there was something seriously wrong with Donna health-wise that made her run off like that. Perhaps some psychological disorder that was hereditary from her family. Thoughts like that kept him up for all hours, worrying endlessly over Donna, no matter how much he didn't want to. He didn't want to care about her anymore as anything other than the mother of his children but he couldn't stop himself. As much as he hated what she'd done and as angry as he was with her, he still loved her with everything in him and that made the whole situation infinitely more complicated. If he could only hate her, things would be so much easier. He could just end their marriage and focus on his daughters with all his heart, putting all this misery behind him. But no matter how much he tried to ignore it or deny it, his heart belonged to Donnatella Igraine Lyman. He couldn't help wondering, though, if her heart still belonged to him.  
  
"Hey," a voice broke through the haze of Josh's mind. He turned to find Bobby standing in the kitchen doorway. "You alright?" Josh didn't answer, just stared out through the kitchen window to the night sky of the suburbs. "Look I'm sorry about Freddie. He didn't realize- -."  
  
"I know, it's okay," Josh interrupted quietly, finally turning back to face Bobby. "He's just a kid. It's not his fault that the people raising his classmates have no conception of what the Fourteenth Amendment ensures."  
  
"That's the one that protects you from state action, not the Beltway gossip mill," Bobby pointed out as he moved to go over to Josh.  
  
"But shouldn't there be one that says I have the right to decimate anyone who pisses me off right now?"  
  
"Well the framers put the Second one in there for something. Maybe this was it." They fell into a calm silence, just standing in the kitchen listening to the sounds of Helen and the boys in the rest of the house. Finally Bobby asked, "How's work going? With Toby I mean. Are you two still- -?"  
  
"No we're okay now," Josh said, referring to the amount of arguing the two of them had engaged in a few weeks ago. He'd blamed Toby for what had happened in the beginning, thinking if he hadn't gone to Donna in the first place about his worries over the abortion matter, none of this would have happened in the first place. But eventually he came to see that he and Donna would have come to blows over something anyways so he and his Chief of Staff had been able to patch things up. "I wish I could say the same for me and her family."  
  
"They're still not speaking to you?"  
  
"Well Nicole gives me those pleasant, scornful looks whenever she drops by the office for Toby and my brother-in-law still hangs up the phone when I call him to see if he's heard anything. But only after telling me exactly where exactly I can shove my concern. I can't get a hold of her grandmother and she didn't really have any friends in the area that she spoke to often, except Helen.  
  
"What about her best friend, the one from England?"  
  
"Lily? No, Lily would call me if she knew anything, if not for my sake than for the girls'."  
  
"I think it's unfair," Bobby told him. "Donna was the one that kidnapped your daughters and you're getting blamed for it by her family."  
  
"Well they never liked me that much in the first place," Josh explained sourly. "Except for Mena. Mena has a big crush on me. T.J. just hated me outright from Day One and Nicole.I don't know about her. She always kind of held herself off at arms length a little bit. Like she wanted to care about me but she just knew I'd somehow screw it up with Donna."  
  
"You didn't screw this up on your own. She helped you out plenty in the department," he pointed out.  
  
"I know, I know," Josh agreed. "She's the one who ran away because she was unhappy. But I didn't know she was unhappy. I was so wrapped up in being Senator Lyman that I just let her slip away from me. I was so busy I couldn't make her see that she could talk to me."  
  
"Okay she was unhappy and ran away. Fine, I can accept that. But why is she not letting the girls call you at least? Why is she keeping them hidden away you? That's just plain wrong, no mother in their right mind would do that."  
  
"Yes she could," a new voice interjected. The men looked up to see Helen in the doorway, arms folded across her chest and glaring at her husband. "If she were desperate enough she could. I could name dozens of mothers I know who run away with her children whenever a situation gets out of control."  
  
"But we're not talking about some woman who goes to the next town over for a couple of nights to pull herself together," Bobby argued calmly. "We're talking about someone who's disappeared off the face of the planet without any thought or care as to what her husband's going through."  
  
"Of course she cares about Josh!" Helen declared passionately, both forgetting that Josh was in the room with them for a minute. "She wouldn't have stayed as long as she did in DC if she didn't. She was miserable from the moment they got here! And Donna is a woman whose children mean everything to her. Of course it makes sense that she'd take them with her."  
  
"Then why is she not calling Josh to tell them they're okay if she loves him this much?"  
  
"Because she's scared. And doing the rational thing is a complete contradiction of what people do when they're afraid."  
  
"All right! Enough!" Josh cried, tired of the two of them hashing out what went wrong with his marriage in front of him. Bobby and Helen turned to him, guilty expressions on both of their faces. Josh took a deep breath. "I appreciate that you guys care this much about us, I really do. But I can't listen to another person tell me what's going through Donna's mind or how I should feel about it. I just can't take it. I hear it everyday from my mother and Toby and President Bartlet; I know you all mean well but it's just something I don't need right now."  
  
"We're sorry," Helen apologized contritely, putting a supportive hand on his shoulder. "You guys are some of the best friends we've had and we just want to do anything we can to help."  
  
"Thank you," Josh replied, meaning it. He glanced up at the kitchen clock. "I should get going."  
  
"You sure you don't want to stay for coffee or something?" Helen asked wanting to make sure that Josh wasn't leaving because he felt uncomfortable.  
  
"It's a nice offer but I really have to get home. I still have some work I need to do for tomorrow."  
  
"I'll drive you back to your car," Bobby said, going to get his keys and coat. Josh and Helen followed him.  
  
"Listen," Helen told Josh as he got his coat. "You call the minute you hear something or if you need anything at all. Day or night we're here for you."  
  
"Thank you." Josh leaned over to plant a kiss on her cheek and walked out of the house with Bobby. They got into the car and began the drive back to the Capitol building in the sleepy silence that comes over people during late night car rides. When they reached Josh's car Josh thanked Bobby for the meal and the ride. He was at his car door when Bobby called out to him.  
  
"Hey Josh!" He turned to look back at him. "What are you gonna do?"  
  
"What do you mean?"  
  
"What are you gonna do when she comes back?"  
  
Josh leaned against the hood of his car and was silent for a moment. "I.I don't know yet, Bobby."  
  
"You can forgive her?" Bobby asked skeptically with raised eyebrows. "She can come home and just say that she's sorry and have that be that?"  
  
Josh bit his lip in frustration. "Why are you so determined to make her the bad guy in all this? I thought you were a friend to both of us. It was my fault as much as it was hers, you know that."  
  
"I'm not saying that. I care about Donna a lot and I pray to God she's all right. But what she did was wrong, a hellva lot more wrong than what you did."  
  
"Yeah," he said softly. He thought for a minute before he answered the original question. "Before she left I loved her more than I thought possible but that night I hated her more than anything. What I mean is I love her but I just can't seem to forgive her. And I don't know what to do with that."  
  
Bobby nodded slowly. "That's fair." He waved good-bye. "I'll see you tomorrow. I heard that Ramirez wants your vote on housing subsidizes. I'll call you later, I have some notes at my house."  
  
"I'll talk to Toby. Thanks." He climbed into his car and watched Bobby drive off back to his house, his wife, and his kids; Josh thought he'd be willing to kill to be able to do that now. Sighing, he started his car and pulled out of the parking lot, making his way home.  
  
When he got there he let himself in house and just before he entered the doorway he paused for a second, listening carefully for any sounds from inside. Hoping against hope that when he got inside, they'd be there. Natalie, rolling around on the floor making a mess of the pristine clothes Donna chose for her; Emma, curled up on the couch with a book and eager to talk about her day; and Donna, just doing anything at all. Sometimes when he'd come home, before they left, he'd watch them play out this scene or a hundred others like it. He'd realized that since they were gone that those moments watching them, when they didn't know he was there, how important they really were to him. How much he depended on them for peace of heart rather than peace of mind. Collecting himself, he put his key in the lock and turned, pushing the door open slowly. Flicking the lights on, he saw the house was as he'd left it this morning: empty. Empty of life, of love, of anything. It was just a house, it wasn't home; home was wherever his family was right then.  
  
Sighing, he put his stuff down and shrugged off his coat, placing it on the coat rack. He made his way into the kitchen where the family cat, Lulu, was perched on the island. Petting the calico and listening to her purr, he was reminded of how excited Emma was when she first told him about getting the cat nearly three years ago and how happy she was just to sit and play with her when she got home from school. Donna must have left in hurry to leave without Lulu; Emma was probably upset when she found out her beloved cat was staying behind. He knew, as much as he normally disliked members of the feline family, that it was his job to take care of the cat until Emma returned home. He just hoped it was soon for everyone's sake.  
  
Setting the cat down, he went to refill her food and water bowls. Once she was taken care of, he started sorting through the mail he'd picked up on his way in: Bill, bill, a letter from his mother on a dig site in Morocco, bill, solicitor, solicitor. Nothing from Donna or anyone else who might have a clue as to where she was. This was getting out of hand; Josh hadn't involved the authorities yet because he trusted that Donna would eventually come home and in the mean time Emma was contacting him to tell him they were okay. She'd asked in her only note to him that he not try and contact her, and he complied, if only because he wanted her to come back. But it'd been a month now and still no word on where they were or when they were coming home. Her family was stonewalling him if they knew something and he had no clue where to begin searching for her without their help. 'This has gone too far,' he thought. 'This waiting game has got to end.' He knew it would upset Donna later but tomorrow he was calling Mike Casper and asking him for his help.  
  
After deciding this, Josh went to get his work so he could prepare for tomorrow's meeting with the committee. As he was leaving the kitchen the phone started to ring. Assuming it was Bobby checking up on him given the late hour, he answered it swiftly.  
  
"Listen, Bobby, I've been home for like five minutes," he said without preamble. "Definitely not enough to get shit-faced if that's what you're worried about and I haven't called Toby yet about Ramirez so why don't you just- -."  
  
"Josh," the voice on the other end cut him off. A voice that didn't belong to Bobby. A voice he had both longed and dreaded to hear from again. "Jo.Josh, it's me."  
  
He absently dropped the papers to the floor and sunk into a nearby chair. He swallowed furiously, trying to generate some moisture in the desert that had become his mouth. Finally he was able to speak.  
  
"Donna?" 


	3. Chapter 3

That Night: Thunder Bay, Ontario  
  
"Donna?" he repeated, not fully believing that she was there on the other end of the phone somewhere.  
  
He sounded so small, so unsure. Almost like he were a small child. She could practically hear the whirring going on inside his mind. It'd been more than a month since they'd even heard each other's voices and out of the blue she was calling in the middle of the night. It must have thrown everything off balance for him.  
  
Gathering her courage, she cleared her throat and continued. "Yeah it's me," she replied quietly. She was out on the back deck, wrapped in a shawl and pacing slowly on the wooden surface. She listened to his breathing hitch over the line and felt tears well up in her eyes at hearing the sound of his voice. For a minute, they stayed like that, listening to each other's breathing growing slightly erratic and feeling a weight lift from their hearts that neither of them knew they had carried.  
  
Finally though, Donna decided that they needed to start talking or she'd end up losing her nerve. But she didn't know what to say so she just said the first thing that came into her mind. "How.how are you, Josh?"  
  
She heard him suck in a deep breath and knew that that wasn't the way she should have began. "How am I?" he repeated in a low voice. Donna could tell from his tone that there was an awash of anger and bitterness boiling inside of him. She squeezed her eyes shut and braced herself for his condemnation. But much to her surprise, he said nothing. She heard him get up from wherever he was and slowly release the breath he'd been holding in. What she didn't see was him stumble back towards the nearest wall and press against it with everything in him. "Obviously, I've been better," he said carefully when he finally spoke again. He cleared his throat nervously. "How.how are you?"  
  
"I'm okay," she answered, grateful that he seemed to be handling this calmly for the time being.  
  
"And the girls?" he asked impatiently.  
  
"They're fine," she replied quickly to help ease the anxiety she heard in his voice and the distress she knew had to have been clenching at his gut for the past month. "They miss you a lot."  
  
"Can I talk to them?" Josh asked her eagerly, longing to be able to tell them that he loved them again and hear it reciprocated.  
  
"They're sleeping," Donna informed him regretfully.  
  
"Okay." He was quiet for a moment before asking, "Well can you wake them?"  
  
She paused for a minute, collecting her strength. "I don't think that's a good idea right now. I think first we need to--" She was cut off by the sound of what was unmistakably a glass being hurtled into a wall on the other end of the phone.  
  
"Damn it, Donna! What the hell did I do to you that made you do this to me?!" He shouted at her, all the emotions he'd been suppressing futility for the past month rushing out of him like a burst of fire, her calm rational lost to him in that moment. She leaned back against the sliding door and willed herself not to break down right then. With the phone pressed tightly to her ear, she could hear him drawing in ragged breaths as he tried to regain control. When he spoke again, he sounded so broken to her. "Do you really hate me this much?" he asked pitifully.  
  
"Josh no," she whispered earnestly, his pain searing her like a knife through her heart. "I don't hate you."  
  
"Then why are punishing me like this?" he begged her desperately, pounding against the living room wall in his aggravation at being so close to his daughters in one way yet still so far apart. "I just want to talk to them. I haven't seen them in a month; I can barely even stand to go a few hours each day without talking to them. Please, Donna. Why can't you just wake them?"  
  
"Because," Donna said with more strength than she really had, "you and I are probably going to end up screaming and yelling at each other at some point soon during this conversation and I'd rather not put them through that, especially Emma." She heard him pause as he considered this. This was hard on him, she knew, but she wasn't going to make her daughters live out part of the nightmare she'd lived through as a child. "You know she could hardly stand it when we argued over stupid things at home; it really freaked her out sometimes. Can you imagine what hearing us like this would do to her? And don't promise that we'll be able to stay calm during all this because we both of us know we won't be able to."  
  
"Yeah," he agreed quietly, his love for his daughter overpowering his own wants. "All right. It'll just be you and me for now then."  
  
She breathed a quiet sigh of relief. "I swear I'm not doing this to hurt you, Josh. But this whole ordeal has been hard enough on Emma already. I'm not going to do this to her on top of everything else."  
  
"No you're right. We are definitely going to end up yelling at each other pretty soon," he said in a resigned tone. "It's best she not hear that."  
  
His comments filled her with trepidation but she forged ahead. "Well, what do you want to talk about then?" she asked cautiously.  
  
"Where are you?" he immediately asked.  
  
"With friends."  
  
"That's not what I meant."  
  
"I know it's not what you meant. I don't want to tell you yet because while we're talking you'll make plane reservations on-line and be here by morning, and I'm not sure if I'm ready to see you again yet."  
  
"How do you know I haven't had the phone tapped?" Josh challenged her. "How do you know that Mike and his FBI buddies aren't tracing this call and tracking you down as we speak?"  
  
"Because we both know you're not that smart, Josh," she retorted quickly. 'How absurd,' she thought to herself. 'Even when we're fighting, we're still us.'  
  
'She's got me there,' he thought, both loving and hating that she could still read him so well. "You're right, I'm not that smart. But I thought I was at least smart enough to call all of your friends that I knew to see if they knew where you were and you weren't with any of them. So which one of them was lying?"  
  
"None of them were. I'm staying with a friend I didn't tell you about."  
  
"I thought I knew all your friends."  
  
"There's a lot about me that you don't know."  
  
He laughed bitterly, taking the cordless phone into the living room so he could have more room to pace. "Believe me, Donnatella, I'm the last person in the world that needs to be told that."  
  
She closed her eyes and swallowed back her annoyance. "Look this conversation is going to be hard enough on both of us. Do you mind putting a pin in the passive aggressive behavior for the time being?"  
  
"Well passive aggressive behavior is what got us here in the first place, though surprisingly not by me," he spat out at her.  
  
"You think our marriage is imploding because of just me?" Donna shouted at him, her anger getting the better of her. "You think I did this all by myself? Because I sure as hell don't!"  
  
"What the hell does that mean?"  
  
"I wasn't the one that wanted power and prestige no matter what it did to my family!"  
  
"I wanted it because you let me go ahead and get it!" he cried out in frustration. "I told you from the very beginning if you didn't want me to do it, I wouldn't have. But you were the one that kept her mouth closed and shut me out whenever I tried to talk you about what was wrong. And just so we're clear on it, I did know something was wrong so don't try to use that excuse with me."  
  
"Good, I'm glad to know that now. It makes everything all better now that I know you knew something was wrong," she replied with angry sarcasm dripping from her voice like syrup.  
  
"Well at least I was trying to get through to you. At least I was trying to do something to help you. If I'd known this was going to happen, I'd have tried a hellava lot harder."  
  
"I don't think it would have mattered much," she admitted to him sadly. "I probably would have still run away. It's what I do, after all."  
  
He paused for a minute at that unusual confession. "I don't understand, Donna. What do you mean you'd have run away no matter what?"  
  
"Because I'm me," she said sarcastically, her self-loathing apparent to Josh even though he was talking to her with nearly a thousand miles between them. But to Donna, it was as if she were talking to another man in her life that had caused her great pain. Only this pain had been dormant for so many years, it washed over like a tidal wave she could not control. Slumping down tiredly to the ground she continued, "And I run away when things get too hard because that's what my father taught me to do. You're marriage is too much for you to deal with? You're life is completely fucked up? Screw your loved ones, just run away from everything and everyone until it all makes sense again. Well guess what? It still doesn't make any sense to me, Daddy! And it's not any better! It's not." Her diatribe faded away as gut-wrenching sobs overtook her and she let herself cry for the first time in a long time at what her father had done to her psychologically.  
  
All the while, Josh was listening on the other end to his wife's tears with drops of moisture falling from his own eyes. He'd never known how much her father's leaving as a child had affected her because like many things he now knew of, she never talked to him about it. He knew the basics of what had happened in the Moss children's formative years: Evan Moss's drug use, the fighting, and his eventual abandonment of his children. Mena had told him the whole story years ago when Donna had been hospitalized. Hearing the story then had given him very little insight into his wife's psyche but hearing Donna now, Josh felt like a fool for not realizing sooner what was so obvious to him now.  
  
After a good ten minutes or so, Donna finally began to calm down sucking in deep, gasping breaths. Thankfully, everyone in the house had either gone out or already gone to bed so they'd been spared her theatrics. But Josh hadn't; he'd been on the line the whole time with her, letting her vent her emotions to him even after the way she'd treated him. He could have rightfully told her to not blame anyone else for her misdeeds but he hadn't. It made her feel so incredibly guilty that he could still be so considerate with her after what she'd done to him.  
  
"Donna? Are you okay?" Josh asked when her breathing began resembling that of a normal person once more.  
  
She sniffed loudly. "No I'm not," she told him honestly and half-heartedly. "I haven't been for a long time."  
  
He nodded even though she couldn't see him. "I think I'm finally starting to realize how true that is." They were both silent as they reevaluated what the last few months of their marriage had been like from the new insight they now held.  
  
"And it wasn't you. It was me too," Donna finally spoke. "I'm the one who didn't speak out in the beginning when I should have. I should have told you how unhappy I was."  
  
"You shouldn't have had to. I should've known to try harder and dig deeper with you," Josh apologized. "This is as much my fault as it is yours. I'm the one who wanted to be President someday. I swear to God if I ever made you feel less than what you are I--"  
  
"You never made me feel anything but loved and wanted," she told him passionately. "I made myself feel the way I did. It was my insecurities and fears that made me think the way I did. I projected my self-hatred at your career instead of dealing with it. Made myself believe that I felt the way I did because you were doing something so amazing with your life and I just felt like a passenger."  
  
"Donna, you weren't a passenger. You were giving me the directions in the front seat." He laughed lightly. "I never would have been elected if it hadn't been for you. You kept me going and the campaign going and it was a success because of you. This was all because of you and the girls, because I love you so much I have to make this world better for all of you."  
  
That touched her deeply. "Thank you," she whispered, smiling and grateful. "I know this may sound.I don't want to.I love you."  
  
For a moment, he said nothing and Donna feared that he wouldn't be able to. That maybe everything she'd done really was unforgivable. On his end, Josh was staring at one of the many family portraits of them all that he'd hung on the wall recently. With Donna and the girls gone, he'd hung more pictures of them up around the house in an effort to bring them closer to him. Finally she heard him whisper so softly that she almost didn't hear him, "I love you, too. You're my wife." She started to breathe a sigh of relief until he continued. "But you're also the woman who stole my kids from me for a month. That was." He shook his head, recalling the hell he'd lived through, the agony she'd caused him. "I.I don't know, Donna. I don't know--"  
  
"Are you trying to say that you'll never forgive me for leaving with the girls?" she interrupted, unconsciously holding her breath and preparing herself for the worst.  
  
He thought for a minute, trying to organize and categorize the various emotions surging through him. "No, that's not it," Josh corrected his wife. "I'm saying I want to forgive you, I really do, more than anything. I just don't know if I can. And I'm not sure if there's a middle I can go to with this. But I do know one thing."  
  
She steeled herself for the worst. "What is it?"  
  
"I want you and the girls home. Now."  
  
"What?" she asked dumbly, not expecting that one just yet.  
  
"I want you three to come home tomorrow," he told her seriously. "We can't fix this over the phone, Donna. We've got to talk this out one-on-one. And the girls need to be home you know this. Not just for me, even though I need to see them more than anything. I mean Emma has school and they both need to be with their family. You need to be with your family; they're about ready to kill me."  
  
"They're mad at you?" Donna tried to misdirect him.  
  
"Yes, but that's beside the point," he went on, not falling for it. "The point is you need to come home now. Please tell me you know that."  
  
She did know it; that was the hard part, knowing she was needed and not being able to rise to the occasion. Even after talking with Josh, even after admitting so many things to herself during the course of their conversation, something inside of her, some instinct she couldn't pinpoint, told her she couldn't go home yet. She just wasn't ready to for some reason.  
  
"I do know that, Josh," she answered, taking a lock of her hair and twirling it nervously between her fingers. "But I don't think I can. I'm just not ready to--"  
  
"Donna, you need to come home," he told her sternly. He felt so frustrated, like he was talking to a small child. 'After all that, she's still going to do this to you,' he thought incredulously. "You.you need to come home."  
  
"I know you think that this sounds selfish and unreasonable but--"  
  
"Donna, come home tomorrow or don't come home at all," Josh said, saying the words that some desperate part of him made him say. He hadn't wanted to say it, but the way she was talking it sounded like she wanted to stay away from him for even longer. And that meant being away from his daughters longer, something he couldn't stand to do any more. But he didn't say it out of anger at her or as a threat. It was a promise. "I love you very much," he explained hastily to a shell-shocked Donna. "But I just can't do this anymore. I can't keep playing this waiting game. It's killing me, Donna. It's killing any hope I have left that we can get through this. I need to be with Emma and Natalie and I need to be with you. I can't.I can't let you put us on hold any longer. If we're going fix this marriage, we need to do it together. Here. At home." He stopped, wondering if he'd gone too far, if his demands were that outlandish. He didn't think they were but he couldn't tell what Donna would think given her current state of mind. "Donna are you--?" he started to ask.  
  
"I'll call you in the morning after I book the flight so you can meet us at the airport," she replied quietly in a single breath, still twirling her hair on the other end. She heard him breathe a deep sigh of relief as she herself felt a stone of fear lodge itself deep in the pit of her stomach.  
  
"Thank you," he said gratefully. "Thank you so much."  
  
She could hear the happiness in Josh's voice and just like before, she couldn't bring herself to dampen his spirits by telling him that by forcing her to come home, he was pushing her further away emotionally than she'd been before. She could just feel that if she went home now, it would do more harm then good. But she didn't have the energy to argue with Josh anymore. Instead, she said, "I'll call you in the morning."  
  
"Okay, that's fine," Josh replied happily, thanking every god above that something had finally gone right and that he and Donna could get it together. "Do you want me to call your family? They've been really worried about you."  
  
"Yeah, that'd be great. Just tell them not to come by tomorrow. I don't want to be overwhelmed completely when we get back. Tell them I'll call and we'll set something up."  
  
"Sure. I'll, uh, I'll let you get some rest. You must be tired."  
  
"I am," she said, fully feeling the emotional strain this conversation had caused her. "I'll call tomorrow."  
  
"Tell the girls I love them and that I can't wait to see them," Josh said, smiling on his end like a kid in a candy store. He'd finally see his little girls again tomorrow. He'd finally have his family again.  
  
"I will. Goodnight."  
  
"Night." They both hung up the phone, each feeling very different things. While Josh was overjoyed about the fact that he'd see his children tomorrow and a bit nervous about seeing his wife again, Donna was just plain terrified. She made her way into the house, gripping her shawl in one hand as she opened the sliding glass door and stepped into the house. Inside, she leaned heavily against it and let her emotions wash over her, trying to mentally prepare herself for tomorrow.  
  
"I can't do this," she whispered fearfully to herself.  
  
"Do what?" a voice startled her from the other end of the room. Turning left, she saw Lily there, curled up in an armchair wearing a bathrobe and slippers and looking at her curiously.  
  
"What are you doing up?" Donna asked her friend when she'd regained her voice.  
  
"Couldn't sleep. What about you?" She noticed the phone that Donna was clutching to her. She looked into Donna's eyes. "Did you.?"  
  
She nodded. "Yeah I did."  
  
"And.?"  
  
"And we're going home tomorrow," Donna said, trying to sound happy about it but knowing she couldn't fool Lily.  
  
Lily nodded her understanding. "And you don't think you're ready?" Donna shook her head. "Do you want to talk about it?" Again, Donna shook her head. "Is there anything I can do to convince you to not be scared?" Once again, no. Seeing she'd make no progress and how tired Donna was, Lily just patted her arm and smiled. "All right then. Let's get you guys packed up for tomorrow."  
  
"Yeah that's a good idea." Donna put the phone down and they started up the stairs together. "Catherine's not home yet?"  
  
"No it's only midnight."  
  
"Oh Happy Hour at the local bar."  
  
"I swear every hour is Happy Hour with that woman."  
  
They entered Donna's room to start packing. Donna had moved Natalie's crib to Emma's room, anticipating a late night, although now there was a different reason for it. "You know, sometimes I don't know how you are her daughter."  
  
"But I am. I am bound to that woman for life, God help me." She went to the closet and pulled out Donna's luggage. "She drives me absolutely mad sometimes but that's the thing about mothers and daughters. No matter how much you want to hate each other sometimes, there's always that little shred of.something that keeps you from jumping off the deep end."  
  
Donna smiled to herself as she folded clothes and packed. "I'll keep that in mind. It'll probably be a full-time job for me to keep my sanity when these girls are teenagers."  
  
Lily looked at her carefully as she cleaned out the bureau of knickknacks. "Speaking of jobs, I've got one for you if you're interested."  
  
Donna stopped what she was doing. "What do you mean?"  
  
"I didn't say anything before because you didn't need this along with all the other shit you were going through but hear me out: My dad finally caved and he's gonna finance a magazine I'm gonna run in the States."  
  
"A magazine of your own?"  
  
"You know that's what I've always wanted for myself. Be William Randolph Hearst, only without the mistresses and giant castle. But I'm really doing it." Lily's eyes shone with unbridled excitement. "I'm gonna call it Woman because that's who were gearing it towards."  
  
"But there are dozens of those on the market," Donna pointed out, momentarily forgetting the job offer to advise her friend. "How can you hope to compete?"  
  
"Because it's not going to be just another magazine that tells women what they should wear or how to cook a tuna casserole in fifteen minutes or how to get a man. It's going to be about what really affects us: politics, economics, education, health, even just finding time in our lives to remember we're women. And we'll do it better than anyone else because it'll be the truth and not just what some man thinks is the truth about women." She came over and grabbed Donna's hands. "So what do you say?"  
  
"What do you need me for? You sound pretty well organized."  
  
"I want you to write a column for it."  
  
"A column?" Donna laughed out loud. "I'm.I'm not a writer. I don't know the first thing about what to write."  
  
"Just do what all writers do: write what you know," Lily explained. "And don't tell me you can't do it. When you wrote for school newspapers in high school and college, the pieces you wrote were the most talked about. And you've had more life experiences than women twice your age. Look you said you wanted something for yourself that wasn't about Josh or the girls and this is it." She looked deep into her friend's eyes and saw the mixture of emotions there. The excitement, the uncertainty, the fear, but most of all the tiredness. "Look don't decide anything tonight. Let's get you home first and we'll work from there."  
  
"Yeah," Donna nodded going back over to the pile of clothes she was folding. The more clothes she put in the suitcase, the closer she was to getting home. She hated herself for dreading it but she did. Josh was giving her a second chance, giving them a second chance. She should be thrilled but again something held her back, something made her afraid. And now with Lily's job offer, she only felt more confused. But after everything she put her daughters through, she felt she owed them this so she continued to pack, already knowing things weren't going to be all right tomorrow.  
  
The girls woke up the next morning and they were bouncing off the walls with excitement when they learned they'd see Daddy that day. After she'd left Josh a message on his cell with their flight information and bid a colorful farewell to Catherine, Donna, Lily, and the girls headed off to the airport to return to their respective homes. Lily's flight left an hour after Donna's so after they'd all checked their luggage and gotten their tickets, they sat in the waiting area by the gate that would take Donna and her children home.  
  
Lily was entertaining the girls and keeping them under control while Donna was lost in her thoughts. 'I can't do this,' she thought for the millionth time. 'I know I can't but I don't know why I can't. Holding back tears of frustration, she glanced at her daughters. Emma was chattering full blast about all the stories she had to tell to her school friends while Natalie was content to sit in Lily's lap and chew on Lily's hair. 'Why can't I be this happy?' she thought bitterly. 'They're going home to see their family and friends and their.' Suddenly, it hit her like a bolt of lightning. "Oh my God," she breathed.  
  
"What is it, Donna?" Lily asked, concerned over the ashen appearance her friend had just taken.  
  
Before Donna could answer, a voice over the intercom broke out, "Now boarding, Flight 392, St. Paul to Dulles. All passengers please proceed."  
  
"Mommy that's us!" Emma cried, jumping out of her seat and gathering her carry-on backpack. Donna looked at her and at Natalie and then back into Lily's worried eyes.  
  
"I can't go," Donna told her, meaning it.  
  
"What do you mean?" Lily asked her, trying to disengage Natalie's mouth from her hair.  
  
"I know why I can't go back and I know what I have to do about it." She set Natalie down on the hard plastic chair and hugged Lily tightly. "Go back with them, make sure Josh gets them.  
  
"Donna what the hell are you doing?" Lily asked her, desperate to understand what was going on in her mind. "Why are you--?"  
  
"Girls listen to me," Donna said, pulling away from Lily and kneeling down beside them. She wrapped an arm around both of them and hugged them fiercely. "You're gonna go home now to Daddy. But Mommy isn't."  
  
"Where are you going?" Emma asked in a frightened voice.  
  
"I have to do something very important and I can't come home until I do," Donna tried to explain. "But you girls get to see Daddy now and you get to have fun with him and when I come back--"  
  
"Mommy no!" Emma cried out, clinging to Donna. "Please don't leave us!"  
  
"Oh baby, please don't cry," Donna said, her heart breaking at her little girl's sorrow. "I'm not leaving you, I swear. It's gonna be fine, you'll see."  
  
"But I'm sorry, Mommy, I'm so sorry!"  
  
"What are you sorry for?"  
  
"That I didn't like my new school and I was mad and that made you mad and it made you and Daddy fight and us leave," Emma explained tearfully, burying her head in her mother's shoulders. Donna felt her chest tighten at the thought that Emma had blamed the separation entirely on herself. 'Like mother, like daughter,' she thought. "I promise I'll never be mad or bad again, just please come home! Please let us be a family again."  
  
"Emma, Emma look at me." Donna pulled her daughter back and gently wiped away at the tears cascading down her little cheeks. She smoothed back the long blonde hair and planted a kiss on her forehead. "You did nothing wrong. You did absolutely nothing wrong. We didn't leave because you didn't like your school and when you get home, your Daddy is going to tell you the exact same thing, I promise. Sometimes grown-ups have problems that children can't understand and this is one of those times. But it doesn't have anything to do with you. Mommy just has to do this but I'm coming back as soon as I possibly can."  
  
"But you said you'd tell me everything," Emma complained.  
  
"And I'll tell you someday, I promise." She kissed the sniffling child again. "But I can't now and I have to go do this before I come home. And I will come home I promise you that."  
  
"And we'll be a family again?"  
  
Donna didn't answer her, just hugged her very tightly. "I love you so much. You take good care of you sister." Donna kissed her head then pulled back to hug and kiss Natalie. "And you too, little one. Mommy loves you and she'll see you before you know it." Natalie looked at her not understanding anything; just that her mother and sister were crying so she felt she had to as well now. "Okay, it's gonna be okay sweetie," Donna tried to calm her.  
  
"Donna they're boarding us now," Lily broke in, with tears of her own. Donna nodded and handed a still bawling Natalie to Lily as well as her plane ticket. "What do I tell Josh?"  
  
"I'll call him later," she said as she leaned over to give Natalie one last kiss. "Goodbye sweetie."  
  
"Mommy please," Emma pleaded with her one last time, grabbing her hand.  
  
Donna took it and put it in Lily's. Looking down at those tear-filled eyes, she prayed she was doing the right thing. "I love you," she said before she turned and walked away from the two people she said she'd never walk away from. 


	4. Chapter 4

Dulles International Airport: March 14, 2005  
  
"Senator, please wait up!" Gus called out ahead of him. Josh stopped his sprinting and turned back to look at his aide. He began to protest when Gus caught up with him and cut him off, "Yeah, yeah, I know, I'm not supposed to call you Senator in personal situations outside of the office, but screaming 'Josh' wasn't working so I figured I'd try this."  
  
"But their plane is landing in exactly," Josh glanced at his watch, "two minutes and thirty-seven seconds and by my calculations we're still a good three minutes from their gate so let's move it!" Rolling his eyes, Gus went over to the information desk to make sure they were going the right way.  
  
"Well we would," Toby gasped as he jogged up besides the two men, "if some of us weren't risking cardiac arrest by doing so!" He was bent over, clutching his knees and heaving in gasping hunks of air as he struggled to regain his breath. At forty-seven, Toby didn't really do that much long- distance running through airport terminals anymore. But for this occasion, he would make an exception.  
  
Josh had stayed up all night and well into the morning after his phone call from Donna, getting the house ready for all of them to come home to. He passed out on the couch around four in the morning and was awoken by the persistent ringing of his cell phone a few hours later. It was Toby, calling from outside with Gus and wondering why Josh hadn't been in the office yet. Once Josh explained to him what had happened, the three men had cleared Josh's schedule for the day and raced to the airport, after discovering that Donna had left a message regarding their flight information, mentioning that the plane would land in Dulles in about an hour. After throwing the car into the short-term parking lot, they ran past through the throngs of people at the airport in order to get to the appropriate gate.  
  
"Toby, we have to get there now!" Josh whined incessantly.  
  
"Josh--" Gus tried to get out as he rejoined them.  
  
"Gus hold on," Toby waved him off. "You're gonna see them, it doesn't matter if you're the first one they see getting off the plane."  
  
"Um guys--" Gus said, trying to step in between them.  
  
"Of course it matters!" Josh cried out, shoving Gus out the way slightly. "They haven't seen or heard from me in a month, Toby! These are my kids for God's sake!"  
  
"Yes, and they're still going to be your kids if you make them wait for five minutes. You will still be able to hug and kiss them in five minutes. However, if you keep this pace up, instead of greeting your daughters in five minutes, you'll be giving mouth-to-mouth resuscitation to your Chief of Staff!"  
  
"Then walk for all I care! I'm running every single foot to that gate!"  
  
"Josh we're at the gate!" Gus finally cried out.  
  
"That's just great.what?" Josh started to shout before he and Toby turned to look at the young man curiously.  
  
Gus sighed, rubbing his eyes. "Flight 392, St. Paul to DC lands in exactly ten minutes, because your watch sucks in a whole different way now, at Gate 24 which is right behind us." He pointed behind Josh and Toby's heads to emphasize his point and the two men turned to see that Gus was in fact correct.  
  
"Oh," they mumbled together. Gus shook his head at the two of them and went to go sit over in some empty chairs. Josh and Toby nodded at each other in apology before going to join him.  
  
"Did you get in touch with Nicole yet?" Josh asked Toby after they'd settled into their seats.  
  
"No, she's still not answering her phone," he replied. In his haste to get the house in order and then to get to the airport, Josh had neglected to call Nicole and T.J. to alert them of their sister's return. Toby had been trying since they'd picked Josh up to get in touch with Nicole but to no avail, and Josh had learned from Ellie when he called their house that T.J. was off on assignment in North Africa.  
  
"Well you should probably keep trying," Josh replied, tapping his foot anxiously and staring at the gate. "She'll want to know, you know."  
  
"Very eloquent," Toby quipped, reaching for his cell phone. He let it ring for a minute before Nicole's voicemail picked up again. For the fourth time, he left the same message and hung up to wait once more. The three men sat beside one another, with Josh closest to the gate, not saying anything for a bit until Josh broke the silence.  
  
"I wonder if she's scared," he said, almost to himself.  
  
"What?" Gus asked, turning to him.  
  
"Natalie. She'd never liked being on airplanes before is what I'm thinking," Josh tried to explain. "Emma does but not her, and she's not even eighteen months yet. I just wonder if she's scared right now. Or maybe because she flew before on the way down there it's not that scary anymore but it was then and she--"  
  
"What are you rambling about?" Toby asked, scratching his beard.  
  
"Nothing," Josh said, shaking him off and glancing at the clock.  
  
"You nervous?" Gus asked, putting a hand on his shoulder. "About seeing Donna again?"  
  
Before Josh could answer him, a voice over the intercom crackled and announced, "Due to technical difficulties on the ground, Flight 392 St. Paul to DC, has been rerouted to Gate 47. Arrival time is unchanged and all those expecting--"  
  
"Shit!" Josh shouted as he sprang up and started jogging toward to the new destination, not waiting to hear both Gus and Toby's groans of annoyance. But he didn't care; all that matter to him right now was seeing his daughters and his wife again, come hell or high water.  
It was a good twenty minutes before Josh was able to navigate his way through the airport to his appointed gate and when he got there, he saw large groups of people either milling about, greeting one another, or heading towards baggage claim. He saw the airport attendants collecting the tickets and closing the gate door. But what he didn't see was his family. 'What the hell?' he thought angrily, turning around every which way to find them. But they weren't there; they weren't anywhere near him.  
"Josh!" he heard Toby call tiredly behind him as he and Gus walked swiftly over to him. They saw his frantic look and the absence of his family. "Where are they?"  
"I.I don't know," he mumbled, still searching. 'How could this be?' he wondered. 'Did we have the right flight number and the right time? Was there some sort of delay they didn't tell us about?' But Josh knew that wasn't the case; he'd triple-checked to make sure all the information he had was correct to avoid being apart from his family any longer than necessary. He didn't know what had happened until that little voice in the back of his mind, the one that every person tries to ignore, began to fill him with doubts. 'You heard her last night,' it said cynically. 'Was she really jumping for joy over the prospect of coming home? Did you really think she'd--'  
  
"Excuse me, Mr. Lyman?" another voice, a real voice, broke in. He turned to find a uniformed man standing in front of him. "You're Mr. Joshua Lyman?"  
  
"Yes," he nodded.  
  
"May I see some ID please?" Josh reached into his pocket and pulled out his wallet showing the man his driver's license. Glancing at it, the man looked back at Josh. "My name is Peter Franks, I work with airport security here. Your two children we're on this flight?"  
  
"Yes they were," Josh replied, feeling a wave of fear wash over him at the thought that something terrible had happened to them.  
  
Seeing the distress on his face, Mr. Franks was quick to ease his mind. "They're perfectly fine, Mr. Lyman. I'm sorry to worry you like that. We had to take them to a holding facility after they departed the plane."  
  
"Why did you do that?" Toby asked, allowing Josh to absorb the fact that the kids were okay.  
  
"The woman they were traveling with did not have the proper ID she needed to clear herself through the gate," Mr. Franks continued. "Her ticket said she was one Donnatella Lyman but her ID was not concurrent with that. She and your older daughter were questioned thoroughly on the plane and we're confident that she poses no security risk but we need you to come and verify some information before we can release her."  
  
"Where are my daughters?" Josh asked quickly, ignoring the facts about the woman Mr. Franks was so concerned with. "I'm not doing anything until I see my daughters."  
  
The airport official nodded his understanding. "They're at the holding facility here. If you'll just follow me, I'll take you right to them." He led the three men back through the airport until they came to the private offices. They went down a series of hallways and stairways until they came to a particular door where Mr. Franks stopped them. Knocking twice, the door was opened from the inside by another official who led them into the office-like area, complete with couches and chairs. But Josh was not concerned with his surroundings; he was concerned with the two most beautiful people in the world sitting on the other side of the room.  
  
Emma looked up from her seat the minute she heard the door open and a huge grin broke out on her face. "Daddy!" she shouted gleefully, springing up from her seat and racing towards him. He dropped down on his knees and held out his arms for her to run into. It felt like an eternity but finally she reached him and wrapped her arms tightly around his neck.  
  
"Oh Emma," he whispered thankfully into her hair as he held her tightly to him, closing his eyes in a prayer of thanks and hugging her like he was never going to let her go. The worry and the tension of the past month seemed to vanish from him as he held his daughter to him, rocking her gently and feeling tears of happiness slip down his cheeks. It took him a minute to realize that there was someone else missing from the equation. He opened his eyes and looked around until he saw his other miracle.  
  
"Daddy!" Natalie shouted with the same joy as her sister had, toddling forward, her pace marginally slower because of her smaller size. But she reached him nonetheless and when she did, he hoisted her up with one arm and wrapped the other around her sister, holding them both with the force and gentleness that only a father can. He memorized the feel of their arms clinging to him, the smell of their freshly washed hair, and the sound of their happy giggles as they were reunited with their daddy. In that moment, Josh knew what true salvation was; he'd never realized before he almost lost them how fiercely he loved these two little girls that had so changed and fulfilled him. He promised himself then that no matter what it took, he'd do everything in his power to make sure that no more pain or sorrow would ever touch them as long as he lived.  
  
"Oh my girls," he whispered reverently. "Are you guys okay?" he asked worriedly, pulling back a little to get a good look at them. He saw that Emma's long, blonde hair had grown a little more and when she smiled at him, he saw one of her bottom teeth was missing. Glancing over at Natalie, he saw that her brown curls had been trimmed slightly and she had a small smattering of freckles dotting her button nose. They seemed perfectly fine to him and he sent up another pray of gratitude. He leaned closer and placed soft kisses over each of their faces. "I missed you so much."  
  
"We missed you too, Daddy," Emma informed him, burying her nose into his shoulder as she inhaled his familiar scent of cologne and aftershave. "We missed you lots but we had fun in Canada."  
  
"Canada? You guys we're in Canada?" he asked, rubbing Emma's back as he tried to have some of his many questions answered.  
  
"Yeah we stayed in a really big house that was on a lake and it was in the woods and we went ice skating and made smores and counted stars and we stayed up really, really late some nights watching funny old movies!" Emma said, pulling back from Josh so she could animate her story with hand gestures.  
  
"Well I missed you girls," he said, kissing Natalie's forehead. "But I'm glad you guys had fun while you were away."  
  
"Excuse me, Mr. Lyman," Mr. Franks said, interrupting the reunion. "But we need you to verify that the woman they arrived with is who she says she is."  
  
"Okay," he replied, getting up from the floor with Natalie in his arms and Emma pressed against his side. Mr. Franks went into another door and opened it, revealing the mystery woman. "Lily?" he exclaimed, thoroughly shocked.  
  
"What? No hello kiss?" she asked, her sarcasm tempered by the situation at hand.  
  
"What the hell are you doing here? Where's Donna.?" Josh asked, scanning his eyes around the small room. Slowly, it dawned on him why he was in a secure holding area to begin with. He smiled the smile of the humiliated, of the angered, and of the betrayed and laughed as though someone had just told him the world was about to end; in a way, for him it had. "Oh my God," he snickered sullenly. "She really--"  
  
"Josh." Lily began before the observing Mr. Franks cut her off.  
  
"I'm sorry, Mr. Lyman," he said, moving next to Lily, "but is this woman who she claimed to be? A Ms. Lillian Irving of London, England?"  
  
Josh stared at her resentfully, as if she were somehow the cause for this latest of his marital woes. "Yeah," he confirmed after a minute, lacing the word with as much contempt as he dared to utter around his daughters.  
  
She met his gaze head on. "Look Josh, I'm sorry about all this but--"  
"Don't," he interrupted her in an even voice. "Just don't. Not now, I can't hear this now."  
  
"Daddy, please don't be mad at Lily," Emma told him from her place. He looked down at the little girl who was holding his free hand with all the strength in her small body, her sad eyes staring blankly at the floor. "It wasn't her fault Mommy left again. She just didn't want to take us with her this time."  
  
"No, Emma it wasn't like that," Lily tried to explain to the child, getting down on her knees. "We talked about this on the plane. She didn't want to leave you two for a second but you guys needed to come home now and she couldn't."  
  
"Why?" Emma asked plaintively.  
  
Lily reached up and brushed her hand across the girl's cheek. "I don't know, my little walnut, but remember what she told you? She's going to come home just as soon as she can." Her last comment was directed at Josh, whose anger gradually diminished as he saw the way Emma looked at Lily so trustingly. He began to realize how much his daughter had been affected by this whole ordeal; she'd need someone with her who could give the love only a mother could give her, and since Donna had vanished yet again, it seemed that Lily would be her stand-in for the moment.  
  
"Excuse me," Mr. Franks interrupted the moment yet again. Lily stood up and he handed her a set of papers. "You're free to go, Ms. Irving. I advise you in the future to be properly documented and accounted for when switching flights last minute in the future."  
  
"What and miss this unwarranted hassle and hospitality?" she replied heatedly, gathering her things.  
  
"It's not unwarranted, Ms. Irving, we have our reasons. Perhaps you saw them on television about three and half years ago. Around September, I believe," the airport official said politely, his tone not hinting at his anger but his face saying everything. For once, Lily had no quick retort and if she had, she'd have kept her mouth shut. Mr. Franks nodded curtly at Josh. "Have a good day, Mr. Lyman. I'm sorry for the trouble. If your party would just return to the terminal, we'd be much obliged." Josh, Lily, and the children left the room quietly to be greeted by Gus and Toby in the hallway. Emma's melancholy dissipated slightly when she saw them and she began regaling them with tales of Canada as they made their way through the terminal. Josh, meanwhile, hung back slightly with Lily and Natalie, keeping a close eye on Emma. It wasn't until they reached the baggage carousal that he spoke to Lily.  
  
"Where'd she go?" he asked, not looking at her.  
  
"I don't know," Lily shrugged. "She just.we got to the airport and she got spooked by something or another. She said goodbye to the girls and told me to bring them to you and that she'd call you tonight."  
  
"You sure you don't know where she is or are you lying to me again?"  
  
"I didn't lie to you last time, Josh," she argued, reaching for a bag that Josh knew was Donna's. "I didn't know where she was until my mother called me a few days ago. Donna went to her after she left you and hid out there, in Ontario where Catherine has a house. I flew up to Canada as soon as I heard so I could try to knock some sense into your wife."  
  
"Evidently you weren't that successful," Josh said, grabbing one of Emma's bags with his free hand.  
  
She shook her head at him. "Look, you're angry at Donna right now and I can respect that. So since she's not here and even though none of this is my fault, go ahead and be as pissed at me as you want but I'll tell you one thing: these girls would not be here now if weren't for me and you could be just little bit more appreciative of that fact."  
  
He took a deep breath and looked at Natalie's face. She looked up at him and reached up to grab his nose in her little hand. She burst out laughing when she got a hold of it and as clichéd as it may have sounded, it was music to Josh's ears. When she grew bored with it and let him go, he leaned down and gave her a kiss on the cheek, leaning his forehead against hers. He felt Lily staring at them, a small smile on her lips. "Thanks," he whispered to her, his tone conveying his gratitude, his anger and resentment gone now that he knew her role in this fiasco that had become his marriage.  
  
"Anytime," she replied, patting Natalie's head as she laid it down on her father's shoulder. She looked back at where Gus and Toby stood waiting with the rest of the luggage. Emma had managed to convince Gus to lift her up onto his shoulders. She looked not quite happy but hopefully she'd get there eventually. "Let's get these girls home." Before they began to approach the others, Lily grabbed Josh's shoulder and made him look at her again. "Look, I know this is probably the last thing you want to hear right now but Donna--"  
  
"You're right, Lily, that name is the last thing I want to hear right now," Josh interjected, shrugging her off.  
  
"She wanted to come back, Josh," she tried again, hoping to get through to him. "I swear on your children's lives she wanted to come back but she couldn't."  
  
He swallowed back his emotions, willing himself calm for the sake of the child in his arms. "I.I don't know what that means."  
  
"It means that she still loves you. After everything that's happened and all the shit you two have thrown at or thought about each other, she still loves you and she wants you, her, and the girls to be a family again. But like I said, something scared her at the airport and she ran off again."  
  
"What do you mean something?" Josh asked, trying to imagine what was holding Donna back from him. "She saw someone at the airport or.? Explain it to me, please."  
  
Lily bit her lip as she thought back to earlier that morning. "We were waiting to board our flights," she finally said. "I was playing with the girls and Donna was thinking, about what I don't even want to try to guess, but all of a sudden she turned ghost white and said that she knew what was troubling her and that she knew what she had to do about it."  
  
"And that was it?" Lily nodded. "Okay," he replied, ingesting this latest bit of news before cataloging it away for a time when he could give it it's proper attention. He tightened his grip on the luggage and his daughter and the three of them started back towards their companions.  
  
The group made their way into the airport parking lot to the car. After a ride that consisted of Emma chattering endlessly and the subtle inquires by Toby, the arrived back at the house to find a visitor waiting for them on the steps; a visitor that Josh was not in the particular mood to see at the moment.  
  
"Aunt Nicole!" Emma shouted as she leapt out of the car and up the steps to where her aunt was sitting on the front steps, like a soldier waiting to trap the enemy. But she was careful to conceal it from her niece.  
  
"Hi sweetheart!" she cried as she engulfed the child in a hug. "It is so good to see you again, I missed you guys so much." Josh let Emma get reacquainted with her aunt as he handed the baby over to Lily. He went to the trunk where Toby was conveniently gathering luggage with Gus.  
  
"I thought I told you to tell her not to come by today," he hissed under his breath. "And I thought you couldn't get in touch with her in the first place."  
  
"She called back while you were getting the girls," he replied, glancing up at her to make sure she wasn't watching their secret conference. "I told her what was going on and she said she'd call later to check in."  
  
"And you believed her?"  
  
"I live with the woman Josh, I have to pick my battles carefully," he explained slamming the trunk shut.  
  
"So sex with your girlfriend means more to you than your boss's marriage?" Josh asked lightly as the approached the house.  
  
Toby raised his eyebrows. "You've never had sex with her," he said seriously though Josh could see a hint of what was a smile tugging on the corner of his mouth. Josh just shook his head and walked towards the steps as if he were the misbehaving child in class going up to the teacher's desk.  
  
She had been joking with her older niece but the smile faded from her face as she saw Josh approach. He stopped at the foot of the steps and eyed her cautiously. "Hey Nicole," he said politely. "How are you?"  
  
She glanced around her surroundings, already knowing what she would, or rather wouldn't, find. "Where's Donna?" she replied in monotone to his greeting, raising an eyebrow.  
  
He didn't answer her, just took Natalie from Lily and walked up the steps passing his sister-in-law on the way. "Come on girls, let's get you guys unpacked," he said putting the key in the lock. He walked inside with Gus, Lily, and Emma on his heels. Only Toby and Nicole remained on the doorstep. She rested her hands in her knees and let out a deep breath, trying to gather her strength.  
  
"Nic, don't do this now," Toby advised her, seeing how emotional she was getting. "The girls just got home, they haven't seen their father in weeks, their mother has gone off to God knows where, and the last thing they need in this situation is to see their favorite aunt in a screaming match with their father."  
  
"A situation that wouldn't exist in the first place if their father had not gone off and hurt their mother so much it forced her to leave home. Again!" Nicole argued passionately, pushing herself up and stalking into the house leaving Toby to stare at her back. Out of respect to Donna and her feelings, he'd opted not to tell Nicole the reasons behind the argument that had pushed her away. Neither Nicole nor T.J. knew about the abortion; in Toby's mind that was Donna's business and no one else had a right to know about it if she didn't want them to. He'd learned that one the hard way. So he kept his mouth shut and the byproduct of that was that Nicole and T.J. now blamed the whole incident on Josh. He'd agreed with Toby when he'd been made aware of the decision and had accepted the anger of his in- laws with dignity and pride. But pride was something he only had so much of and it had taken a beating today already. He prayed it could hold out a little longer.  
  
But it wasn't to be. When Toby walked in the house and set the luggage he'd been carrying down, he could feel the tension radiating off of the walls. The ingredients of the gods had been mixed to perfection and a confrontation was sure to erupt at anytime. And his suspicions were confirmed.  
  
Lily walked up to him with Natalie in her arms with Gus and Emma trailing behind her. "Toby, I'm gonna take the girls to get some new clothes as a welcome home present," she said with fake cheer. "You and Gus should probably head back to the office, keep things running there." She glanced back towards the kitchen. "Let's get them out of here," she mouthed to Toby.  
  
"But Lily I want to stay here for a while with Daddy," Emma complained. "I don't need new clothes."  
  
"I know but you're daddy and auntie need to talk about grown up things right now," she tried to explain. "And we need to give them the space to do that."  
  
"They need the whole house to do that?" Emma asked, trying to put on her coat.  
  
"Probably won't be much of a house left when they get done with each other," Gus murmured under his breath, helping the girl into her jacket.  
  
"Come on, we'll drop you on the way back," Toby said as he led everyone out the door, praying for the best but bracing himself for the worst. But the two people in the Lyman kitchen gave no thought to that whatsoever. Josh and Nicole just stared each other down for a minute, neither saying a word but rather letting their eyes speak for them. Josh finally broke down.  
  
"Alright, whatever you have to say, Nicole, please say it now before the girls get home," Josh told her.  
  
"I don't have anything to say to you," Nicole replied stonily. "There are no words for what I'm feeling towards you at the moment. But if you really want me to try."  
  
"Oh by all means, please do."  
  
Nicole leaned across the island until her face was right in front of his. "You drove my sister away from her family, her friends, her life, and worst of all, her children. I don't know what was said that night or what was going through her mind but I do know that you did nothing, I repeat nothing, to keep her from leaving in the first place."  
  
Josh nodded thoughtfully. "Well," he finally said, "that's an interesting version of history you got there."  
  
"Oh don't you try that condescending crap with me," Nicole warned him. "All I know is before you became a Senator, my sister was fine; she loved her life and then you go off and--"  
  
"She did not love her life, Nicole," he informed her of the information he himself had just received the night before. "In fact, she pretty much hated everything in it except the girls."  
  
"What the hell are you talking about?"  
  
"I'm talking about the fact that Donna's been holding back a lot of stuff from all of us. We talked about it a little last night. Stuff that was hurting her inside."  
  
"Like what?"  
  
Josh paused before he continued. 'This is really going to get her going,' he thought. "Mostly.you're dad." Nicole's face betrayed nothing of what she was thinking so he continued. "And how when he left you guys were all--"  
  
"Shut up," she ordered quietly. Josh stared at her, mouth slightly agape. "Just shut your mouth right now. You didn't live it; we did. We lived with that man and we loved him and it almost destroyed us all. But guess what? We survived it and it doesn't matter anymore."  
  
"Doesn't matter anymore?" Josh repeated in awe. "Nicole, I'm telling you what she told me last night. You're dad leaving like that--"  
  
"Was the best damn thing that he ever could have done for the three of us!" Nicole cut him off, slamming her hand on the counter. "He was a junkie, a loser who hurt our mother and made us all grow up a lot sooner than we should have. But he is gone and I'm not letting you use him as an excuse for what you did to my sister." She paused to take a deep breath, turning away from Josh. "He.he doesn't matter anymore," she said more to herself than to her brother-in-law. "He can't hurt us anymore."  
  
"Yes he can," Josh told her compassionately. "And I'm not using him as an excuse for anything that's happened."  
  
"So what?" Nicole said, her anger recharged after her brief reprieve. "Donna has some sort of Electra complex going on? She loves Daddy so much it drives her mad? What did his leaving have to do with her leaving?"  
  
"She ran away because that's what you're dad taught her to do," Josh explained simply. "To run when it gets too hard."  
  
Nicole looked at him as if he were crazy. "Too hard?" she repeated. She laughed ruefully. "You must thank your lucky stars everyday that Toby ran your campaign because if this is who you really are, you wouldn't have carried a single town in the election. What the hell does that even mean?"  
  
"It means," he continued, ignoring her barbs, "that when she can't control a situation anymore, she runs from it. That's what her life has been about since he left."  
  
"Let me tell you what my sister's life has been about since he left!" Nicole shouted. "Family and friends; she loves them with everything she had in her and she'd give anything for them. That's how wonderful she is; she'd give anything for the people she loves!"  
  
"Until she gets freaked out over something, leaves the country with two kids in tow, and does so without any regard for the person she supposedly would give the most for!" Josh shouted back, his own feelings about Donna and what had happened today boiling over to the surface. Nicole was about to give back an equally heated statement when a ringing phone cut her off. With a sharp glare at his sister-in-law, he marched over to grab the cordless phone. "Hello?" he said gruffly.  
  
"Josh?" a tentative voice said on the other line. "Josh it's me, Donna."  
  
He didn't say anything at all; he knew if he spoke to her in this state he would do irreparable harm to his marriage. Instead he took the phone away from his ear and thrust it towards Nicole.  
  
She eyed it warily before taking it. "Is it Toby?"  
  
"No," he said, leaving the kitchen and going upstairs. "It's your sister." 


	5. Chapter 5

Holiday Inn, Chicago: Same Time  
  
"Hello? Josh, are you there?" Donna asked as she walked around the room with the hotel phone in her hand. She'd managed to get onboard a shuttle flight to Chicago from St. Paul a mere half hour after leaving the girls with Lily and had opted to check into the airport motel for a few days to collect herself emotionally rather than continue on her seemingly never- ending journey of self-evaluation and conflict. After purchasing some clothes and baggage at the nearby mall, and taking a long bath, she bit the bullet and called home to see if the girls had arrived yet. They should have landed at Dulles more than two hours ago and Donna knew that her husband would be beyond disappointed to find out she hadn't come with them but his reaction surprised her. Josh was not the type to be quiet when he was angry about something. When he was depressed, yes; when he was angry, he let you know it. But maybe she'd gone too far this time and pushed him into this state of silence. "Josh will you please talk to me?" Donna begged him.  
  
"Donna?" another familiar voice said in Josh's place. She stopped her pacing and held her breath. "Donna, it's Nicole," the unmistakable voice of her sister continued impatiently. "Are you really there or is Josh just pulling something?"  
  
'This is gonna be fun,' Donna thought to herself sarcastically. Give her an angry husband to deal with and she could usually hold her own; give her a potentially pissed-off older sister and she usually reverted back to child- like tantrums. "Hey Nic," she finally answered slowly.  
  
Donna heard her heave a deep sigh of relief and was momentarily touched that her sister had seemed so concerned. But she immediately put her defenses back up. "Oh Bella, you have no idea how good it is to hear your voice again," Nicole said warmly. Donna smiled even though she couldn't see her, getting temporarily blindsided. "Now where the hell are you?"  
  
That caused an eye roll. "I'm fine, Nicolette. How have you been this past month?" Donna continued, emphasizing the word "month".  
  
"I'd be a lot better if I knew where you were right now. So where are you?"  
  
"Not telling."  
  
"When are you coming back?"  
  
"Not telling."  
  
"Who are you with?"  
  
"Not telling."  
  
"Where the hell are you Donnatella?!"  
  
"Still not telling. Why don't we move on to a topic that's more productive: Did the girls get in okay?"  
  
"Yes they got in okay," Nicole confirmed. "As it was told to me, Lily got them here fine after a minor hold-up at the airport. Can you explain to me why you weren't with them instead?"  
  
Donna sat down on the edge of the queen-sized bed and fiddled with the folded corner of the comforter. This was a question she didn't want to answer yet. "Yes.and no," she hedged.  
  
"What do you mean?" she could hear the bewilderment in Nicole's voice.  
  
"I mean yes, I could explain it to you but no, I'm not going to," Donna elaborated. "I'm sorry but it's all just happening so fast. Everything in the past few years has just happened so fast that I don't even know when it started or what triggered it but--"  
  
"Whoa, whoa, whoa start from the beginning, Donna," Nicole cut in. "You're rambling and I can't keep up with your train of thought. As usual."  
  
Donna smiled slightly at the humorous barb. She really loved her sister; as different as they were, Donna still counted her as one of her best friends. Through all the ups and downs they'd had growing up, they managed to stay allies more often than they were enemies and she was grateful for it. She didn't know what she would have done all these years if Nicole hadn't been there for her, guiding her and protecting her when she didn't even want it. Donna could only hope that Emma and Natalie would have a similar relationship as the years went on. Yet even with all the problems she'd consulted with her older sister, she knew Nicole could never understand.  
  
"Imagine for a moment," Donna began, "that one day you're flying on a airplane and you collapse and are rushed to a nearby hospital to be treated for a life-threatening illness. After several weeks and several secrets revealed, you're released and promptly move in with your fiancée that you haven't slept with yet and your four year-old daughter that you've never lived with all while not being able to work."  
  
"Donna." Nicole said softly.  
  
"Then try to imagine," Donna continued, ignoring her sister and picking up momentum, "that after only a few days at home your fiancée has to leave the state for three weeks while you're on bed rest and when he comes home, he has with him political aspirations you hadn't signed on for when he gave you the ring. The next few months involve arguing, discussions, and a lot of sleepless nights. Add to that, one of your mentors and idols suddenly dies plus your man's gonna be starting that political career a little sooner than expected and you're still not working period..."  
  
"Donna, honey, please--" Nicole tried again.  
  
"Next comes the house purchase, the loss of dear friends, and a shotgun wedding in Reno. The following year of your life is devoted to a campaign you're still not sure you want to work and when that is won, you move once again with two children this time. And while your hubby is off meeting interesting people and devoting himself to his country, you are becoming everything you swore to your mother on her deathbed that you wouldn't become." She paused to catch her breath. "Oh yeah, and imagine that you can't talk to anyone about it because the last thing you want to do is worry anyone. Tell me, how would you handle it, Nicole?"  
  
Her sister didn't say anything for a moment. Finally Donna heard her take in a deep, hitching breath. "I had no idea," she whispered, tears evident in her voice, "that it was like that for you. I feel so horrible knowing all this time you--"  
  
"Nic, don't it's okay," Donna tried to comfort her.  
  
"No it's not," she argued. "I should have known something was wrong and I should have tried to help you."  
  
"I wouldn't have let you. We both know that, just like if it were you in my place, you'd have done everything you could to avoid reaching out. We're not good at it; it's the result of living with a drug addict for so long."  
  
"Why are you doing this?" Nicole asked her disbelievingly.  
  
"Doing what?"  
  
"Bringing him back into all of this," Nicole's anger no longer for herself but rather her sister. "He's not why you didn't talk to anyone or why you ran away. Don't let Josh make you think that."  
  
Donna furrowed her eyebrows in confusion. "What?"  
  
"I know what Josh is trying to do to you," Nicole explained superiorly. "He's trying to make you think, and all of us think, that you blame this whole situation on Daddy so he can get off the hook completely. Well, I'm not buying it for one minute and neither should you."  
  
"Nic, what happened between you and Josh to--?"  
  
"And don't worry about how this whole running away thing is going to play out in court."  
  
"Play out in court?" Donna repeated, trying to catch up.  
  
"Yes look, I know you always hate me planning things ahead for you and all but I've already talked to this great lawyer my friend knows. She said that given Josh's work hours and how you're the girls' primary caregiver and how you've got money of your own, no judge in his right mind would give Josh custody over you, no matter what his lawyer pulls in court."  
  
'Custody? Lawyers?' Donna's brain was on overload. She thought he'd wanted to work things out but maybe after today something had changed for him. 'Oh my God, did he talk to a.' "Nicole, he told you he wanted to divorce me?" she whispered in a frightened voice.  
  
"No of course not. You're divorcing him," she explained as if it was obvious and Donna wanted to strangle her.  
  
"Nicole," she said, struggling for patience, "I'm not divorcing my husband. I want to save my marriage--"  
  
"For the sake of the girls?" Nicole asked incredulously. "Donna you and I have starred in that movie and we both know how it ends so why are--?"  
  
"Because I love him!" Donna cried out. "I love him, Nicole, more than I could ever say to you or anyone else. He's saved me so many times just like I know I've done for him. He has made me a better person, a better friend, a better sister, and a better mother. I want to be with him for the rest of my life and no matter how angry I ever get at him that will never change! Ever!"  
  
"Well what about the fight?" Nicole shouted back. "He loves you so much that he goes off and says such horrible things to you that you have to go and leave the country with the girls--"  
  
"Wait a minute!" Donna interjected. "Why are you blaming this all on him?!"  
  
"Because you were fighting about Josh's work that night," Nicole explained to her confused sister. "That's why you left in the first place."  
  
"Who told you that? Josh?"  
  
"No he didn't say anything about the fight. And neither did Toby, though it's pretty obvious to me that he knows exactly what it was about. So I talked to T.J. about it and we put two and two together. It's pretty clear to the both of us that whatever you two were fighting over had to do with Josh's career."  
  
She said career like it was dirty word. Suddenly, it all became clear to Donna: her family's anger at Josh, Nicole's denial about their father, this conversation. Everything made sense. Leave it to her siblings, especially her brother, to blame all her marital strife's on Josh. "Nicole," Donna started after a minute, "where are the girls?"  
  
"Lily took them shopping so Josh and I could.talk," she told her.  
  
"Where are you now in the house?"  
  
"The kitchen."  
  
"Okay. Go into the living room and close the doors. This is going to take awhile to explain to you and you'll probably be screaming at me by the end of it so I'd rather not have them come home to that if that's alright." Nicole did as she was asked, with more than a bit of curiosity, and when she was situated in the living room, Donna continued, "It started a few months after I started dating Ben."  
  
And Donna retold the entire tale yet again, the same way she'd told it to Lily the previous day. She left no stone unturned; she talked about the abortion, her reasons behind staying with Ben all those years, and the emotional baggage she'd brought into her marriage. With frequent interruptions from her sister and a couple of screaming fights, the story took several hours to be told. People came and went from Nicole's location and several knocks on Donna's door went answered. But finally, when darkness had settled into the cities the two sisters were in, Donna had purged herself yet again.  
  
"I.I just.I don't know what to say to all this," Nicole eventually said, laying back against the sofa, feeling as she'd just been in a fifteen-round boxing match. "All these years, you never said a word. Why?"  
  
Donna just shook her head to herself. "That's what I'm trying to find out, Nic," she told her. "I need to know why I became the person I am today so I can try to salvage my life there. And I need to do this on my own, so I can know for myself that I can."  
  
"I don't get it," Nicole stated honestly. "I don't mean to belittle it at all but I just don't get it." She sighed dejectedly. "I want you to be happy, though, and if this is what you need to do.you have my support."  
  
"Thank you," she whispered thankfully.  
  
"And anything you need me to do, just say it and I'll do it."  
  
"Anything?"  
  
"Anything."  
  
"Go find Josh and apologize. And then get T.J. to apologize too."  
  
"Donna." she moaned like a child.  
  
"No Nicole, you guys were horrible to him," she criticized harshly. "I took his entire family from him and instead of supporting him, like a family should, you berated him for something that wasn't even in his control. And he is family, Nicole, you may not like it but he is."  
  
Nicole accepted her sister's tirade with humility. "Fine," she agreed. "But can you tell me something first?"  
  
"Maybe."  
  
"When are you going to come home?"  
  
"When I find the answers I need."  
  
"But what if you don't like them or you can't even find them to begin with?"  
  
Donna didn't say anything, just gazed out at the night moon that had settled over Chicago. The moon held so many memories for her, both good and bad, from childhood to adulthood. She remembered summer nights when her parents fought for hours on end when she and her siblings would retreat to their backyard fort as an escape from the anger they couldn't yet comprehend. She remembered countless nights on the first campaign trail, staring vacantly out of the bus while debates and discussions were carried out over the guiding presence of the moonlight. She remembered twice looking out of a hospital window into a nighttime sky, a new life cradled peacefully in her arms, as she couldn't decide which of the two visions were more beautiful to her. How many moons had she seen in her lifetime and how many moons had she wished upon for dreams to come true and guidance to be given? But she knew she wouldn't find her answers under the moon's watchful eye tonight.  
  
"I'll call you later, Nicole," she said at last. "Tell the girls that I love them very much and I'll call again soon."  
  
"Okay," she whispered back hoarsely. "What about Josh?"  
  
"It won't matter what I say to him," Donna replied wisely. "He needs time right now and so do I." She sniffed and quickly wiped at her teary eyes. 'Will I ever stop crying? I feel like I'm in the middle of a cheesy soap opera or something,' she thought. "And apologize," she added. "Please apologize to him tonight."  
  
"Okay. I love you, baby sister," she said lovingly.  
  
"I love you too," Donna smiled. "Give my love to T.J. too. Night." Donna hung up the phone before Nicole could reply. She lay back down on the bed and lifted her left hand up above her face. Staring at her ring finger, she thought about the two rings that were lying in her purse. She'd taken them off the morning she'd left with the girls, her heart weighing heavy with the betrayal that she was doing unto her husband. She didn't feel deserving of wearing his love anymore but maybe someday, if she found what she needed on her journey, she could again.  
  
"Goodnight," Nicole said to the dial tone, clicking the phone off and setting it down before burying her head in her hands. She wasn't kidding when she said she'd had no idea that Donna's sorrows and troubles ran so deep. No matter what Donna had said to try to persuade her otherwise, Nicole would always feel a sense of regret and disappointment over not being able to truly be there for her baby sister.  
  
Shaking herself off, she got up from the couch and stretched her aching muscles. Vaguely, she thought she heard the sounds of footsteps on the floor above her. She glanced at the clock and was surprised to find that it was almost nearly nine o'clock at night. She deduced that the girls had arrived home and she left the living room to go and see them. A quick search of the upstairs found the bathroom, Natalie's room, and the master bedroom vacant. It wasn't until she happened upon Emma's room that she found her nieces and their father again. Both girls were in their pajamas, Natalie playing quietly on the floor while Emma and Josh were perched on the bed. Josh was holding a hairbrush in his hands, trying to brush out Emma's long blonde locks and judging by the grimace on her face, he wasn't all that successful at it. "You need some help there?" Nicole asked from the doorway. Emma nodded her head vigorously and after a minute, Josh held out the brush for her to take. He moved onto the floor with Natalie, sitting her down in between his legs as he leaned against the bedpost. Nicole took her place behind her niece and began gently brushing out the sections of Emma's freshly washed hair.  
  
"Were you talking to Mommy on the phone before, Aunt Nicole?" Emma asked innocently as her aunt ran the brush ran through her hair.  
  
"Yes I was," she replied cautiously, glancing at Josh on the floor. He didn't say anything, just continued turning the pages in Natalie's picture book while he listened to them converse. "She said to tell you that she misses you guys and she loves you all very much."  
  
"Did she say when she'd be home?"  
  
"Well, she's not sure of that just yet, sweetie," Nicole tried to explain. "But I do know she won't stay away for a second longer than she has to. But you know what, you haven't told me about this great trip you and your sister just got back from. Did you guys have fun?"  
  
"Yeah we had a lot of fun with Catherine," Emma gushed. She tried to turn her head back. "Mommy said that you guys knew her when you were little."  
  
"Keep your head straight, Emma. Is the Catherine you're talking about Lily's mommy?" Emma nodded to the affirmative. "Yep, your mommy, Uncle T.J., and I knew her when we were little. She was a good friend of our Mommy's, your grandmother." Emma absorbed that and allowed her hair to be brushed for few minutes before Nicole spoke again. "I bet you guys will sleep good tonight, all that traveling must have made you guys tired."  
  
"You're right Aunt Nicole," Emma agreed seriously. "I'm sooooo tired that I don't think I'll be able to go to school tomorrow."  
  
"Yes you will," her father replied from the floor, still looking at the book.  
  
"But Daddy!" she whined.  
  
"No buts, young lady. You've missed too much school as it is. You're going tomorrow."  
  
"Well I think you're wrong about that," Emma sassed him politely.  
  
Josh smiled to himself. "Well I think you're wrong about that," he challenged teasingly.  
  
"I'm not wrong," she retorted emphatically. "I can't be. Moss women are never wrong, that's what Nana Mena always says. Right Aunt Nicole?"  
  
"Most of the time that's true. But sometimes," she looked carefully at Josh, who had turned his head slightly to hear her answer, "we can have preconceived notions that can hide the truth from us." He looked back at her then and while the words never left her mouth, Josh got the message loud and clear. He gave her a half-smile and got up from the floor with a tired Natalie.  
  
"I'm gonna put her down," he told them. "Say goodnight everyone."  
  
"Goodnight everyone!" Emma joked, leaning back against her aunt. Josh just shook his head with a smile as he went to put Natalie to bed while Nicole tucked Emma in.  
  
And for the next couple of weeks, that was what life was about for Josh. He'd get the girls ready in the morning for their day before he headed off to the Capitol Building. While he was working during the day, Natalie, and later Emma, were cared by a reliable baby-sitting service recommended to Josh that worked out nicely. He'd come home around seven, feed the girls their dinner, spend some quality time with them, and get them into bed with the occasional help of his sister-in-law and Chief of Staff. Every night, Donna would call to talk to the girls but never revealed where she was or what she was doing. She'd gotten a new cell phone and had left the number with them in case they ever needed to reach her or if Josh wanted to talk to her about something in private. But Josh, having enough to deal with between caring for his daughters and trying to gain a strong foothold in the Senate, opted not to talk to her just yet. The wounds were still too fresh for him to deal with but day by day, little by little, he was coming around, his anger lessening now that his children were home. He still wasn't sure if he and Donna would be able to work through this but at least now, he had some hope.  
  
One Saturday afternoon, about three weeks after the girls came home, there had been a fluke in Josh's schedule and he was able to take the afternoon off. He took the girls to a nearby park, allowing with some briefing memos to keep himself occupied. Emma and Natalie were playing together in the sandbox and Josh was seated on a bench close by when a shadow appeared over him.  
  
"Hey Josh," a voice Josh recognized said from above him. He turned his head and saw his sister-in-law, Eleanor Bartlet-Moss, standing over him with her one year-old son, Shawn, in her arms. "Long time no see."  
  
"Hey Ellie," Josh replied, putting his work aside and getting up to greet her with a kiss on the cheek. "What are you guys doing here?"  
  
"Visiting the family," she said as she sat down next to him. "We stopped by to see Nicole and Toby. And we came by to let Shawn see his cousins. You're office said you were here. And my husband is with the girls over there." She gazed over the park until she saw the girls and her husband, getting buried by his nieces and enjoying every minute of it. "They've gotten so big."  
  
"Yeah," Josh nodded with fatherly pride. He tickled Shawn's chin. "So has this little guy. Sorry we missed his birthday."  
  
"That's alright. We got the card, it was sweet." Despite his newfound knowledge on the infamous fight, the animosity that Tomasso Moss had always felt for his brother-in-law had not abated that much. Without Donna there to link them together, relations were still strained between the two, much to the dismay of the rest of the family. "So." Ellie continued a little awkwardly.  
  
"So." Josh continued in much the same tone, glancing over at the girls, who were still playing quietly together with their uncle, although a few more children were in the sandbox now. The fact that Ellie had been President Bartlet's daughter prior to being his sister-in-law had made so Josh was never really quite sure how to act around her. They were fine at family gatherings and could even rely on one another for a favor, like when Josh had asked Ellie to "spy" on Donna a year ago during her meeting with Emma's birth father. But just talking with one another outside the safety spheres they'd known was a little uncomfortable for them.  
  
Ellie finally decided to end their impasse. "How have you been with all this?" she asked gently.  
  
He shrugged. "Okay I guess. Some days are better than others."  
  
"I don't know how you do it," she commended him. "If T.J. left me with the baby, alone, I don't know if I could get out of bed in the morning." She paused as she reviewed what she'd just said. "God, is it just me, or does that sound like the opening of a really bad country song?"  
  
Josh laughed with her for a minute before replying, "Yeah that is pretty pathetic. But I'm the same way some mornings so I shouldn't be too quick to judge."  
  
"Really? You seem to be doing so well considering."  
  
"I guess I am, most of the time. But some days." He bit his lip, not sure he wanted to continue. But Ellie was looking at him with such sympathy, that he did. "I wake up and look over and I almost expect to see her hair on the other pillow but then--"  
  
"DADDY!!!" he heard Emma's voice suddenly screech from the sandbox. His head shot up and he saw a group of children and a few adults huddled over something. He dashed over to the group and broke his way through to see what it was exactly they were staring at.  
  
"Oh my God!" he cried out at what he saw. Natalie, his baby girl, was lying motionless amid the sand, a large gash on her forehead spewing out blood. Emma was sitting besides her, sobbing, and T.J. was ripping off his shirt to make a bandage, his eyes wild with fear. "Natalie?! Natalie, sweetie can you hear me?!" he shouted frantically at the small, still, figure, feeling an uncontrollable wave of panic wash over him. He went to scoop her into his arms when a hand on his shoulder pushed him off.  
  
"Don't touch her, Josh," Ellie ordered swiftly, in a tone that was nearly identical to her later mother's, alerting them all she was in charge of this situation. "T.J. let go of the shirt and take the baby." She passed her son over to her trembling husband's hands. Her own hands, trained for years under some of the medical fields' best, quickly went to Natalie's small neck to feel for a pulse and finding one, she turned back to her husband. "What happened?"  
  
"She.she was playing right there on the ledge," he struggled to get out. "And these kids ran by and bumped her and she fell and hit her head."  
  
"I wasn't watching her good enough," Emma bemoaned from her spot near her father. "I'm sorry, Natty, I'm so sorry!" Josh, though desperately worried about his baby, reached over and pulled Emma into his arms to try to comfort her.  
  
"It's okay, honey," he murmured to her, stroking her back as she cried, trying to sound calm for her sake. "She's gonna be just fine." He looked over at his sister-in-law, hoping with everything in him he wasn't wrong.  
  
She met his gaze. "We need to get her to a hospital," she said without any uncertainty. "Now."  
  
A few hours later, Donna walked briskly into the tall hospital looking around until she found a receptionist and she asked for directions to the room number she wanted. As she headed over to the elevators, a thousand thoughts swam through her mind. What if she wasn't welcome? What if too much time had passed? What if he just didn't want to see her anymore or have her a part of his life? But that didn't matter to her now because she needed to be here, more than anything in the world, and she wasn't going to let anything stop her.  
  
Arriving at her floor, she exited the elevator and walked to another receptionist's desk to find yet another set of directions to her destination. Following them until she reached the correct numbered room, she stood outside the closed door with nearly every part of her body shaking from nerves. Taking in a few deep, shallow breaths she forced herself to gain a little bit of control. Finally, gathering all her courage and strength, she lifted her hand and knocked three times on the door.  
  
"Come in," a voice said softly from the other side.  
  
Slowly, ever so slowly, Donna turned the doorknob and pushed the door open. Closing her eyes and sending up a quick prayer, she stepped into the room and looked at her answer, staring back at her strangely.  
  
"Hi Daddy," she finally whispered. 


	6. Chapter 6

Phoenix Memorial Hospital, Phoenix Arizona: April 10, 2005  
  
"Hi," Donna said again as she stood in the doorway, staring intently at the pale, gaunt figure lying in the bed. Evan Moss: her father, her creator, a visual manifestation of all her childhood [and a good chunk of her adulthood] anguish and grief. Someone who represented all this should be striking and imposing but he was none of this. His gray hair was shaved almost to his scalp and Donna could see how rail thin his arms were, how huge the stiff hospital gown looked on him. His face was haggard and drawn, the yellowish skin almost clinging to the bones. But his eyes, the eyes he'd given Donna, were as clear and bright as she remembered them being, even more so because they no longer hid within them the shadowy cloudiness of drugs.  
  
She expected him to be surprised and shocked at her unexpected arrival, perhaps even disgusted and humiliated. But he was none of those things; his head leaning back against the pillow, he turned and smiled gently at her before speaking. "Hi pumpkin," he said, his voice gravelly and low, yet possessing all the sweetness and caring that Donna remembered whenever he spoke to her as a little girl. He lifted up a scrawny arm and beckoned her further into the room. "Come on in. It's okay, I don't bite." He laughed at his joke and was instantly seized by a couching fit that shook through his whole, frail body. When he was done, he motioned to her once more to come in.  
  
Slowly, ever so slowly, Donna eased her way into the room. She finally made it closer to the bed and stood near, taking in her father's appearance. "How come you're not surprised I'm here?" she asked, not looking at his face.  
  
He shrugged nonchalantly, as best he could anyways. "I'm not really sure," he said. "Just a feeling I had, I guess. Why don't you sit down for awhile?" His words hung with the Texas accent he'd been born with that hadn't diminished a bit despite years away from the South.  
  
Evan Moss had been born in rural Wisconsin but had moved with his Sergeant father and army wife mother back to Austin as a baby. He was an only child, like his wife had been, and had grown up like any traditional army brat, hopping from post to post around the country every few years. When he was in high school, he began acting out and getting into trouble so his parents had decided it would be best if he settled back in Wisconsin with relatives. There he met the lovely Antonia Wilder, resident star of Thomas Jefferson High School, and the two began a courtship soon after they met. About a year into the romance, Toni discovered that she was pregnant. With the both of them still teenagers and Evan having enlisted for the service, Evan's parents wanted the baby to be given up for adoption. But Toni's parents and Toni herself, wanted the baby kept in the family, although they had different ideas about childrearing. At her parents' insistence, the local justice of the peace married her and Evan two days before he shipped out to Vietnam. His parents weren't in attendance and relations with their son were strained until their deaths in a boating accident four years later.  
  
When Nicole was born in 1971, Evan's company was already stationed on the Cambodian border. Toni chose the baby's first name, as she did with all three kid's names, but Evan insisted on Nicole's middle name being Morgaine after one of the heroines of the legends of Camelot. He'd always been fascinated by the tales and when he came home, he'd planned on attending college to get a degree in English literature so he could someday teach his love of reading to others. However, that was not to be, as during the war, like most of his fellow soldiers, Evan experimented with a wide assortment of drugs. Unlike others, Evan became hooked quickly. When he returned home in 1972, he did his best to conceal his addiction from his relatives and to continue on with life as it had been before. But he'd brought back with him more than photographs of the countryside and a hash pipe; the lingering memories of the horrors he'd witness and participated in haunted him. He was plagued by visions of screaming women and children and mutilated bodies of friends constantly. But there was no one he could talk to, no friends or family and certainly not his wife who grew more resentful everyday of the life she felt Evan had trapped her in. The children she loved; the husband she did not, a problem they were never able to overcome.  
  
Donnatella Igraine and Tomasso Arthur came along, in 1974 and 1977 respectively, and all three children were the light of Evan's life. He adored them with everything in him, as did Toni, the one thing they agreed on, and he wanted nothing more than to provide a good life for all of them. Of course, when one is harboring an expensive and destructive heroin habit, it becomes difficult to hold down a steady job. This led to raging fights between husband and wife, brief separations, and occasional talks with the lawyers. But Toni's Catholicism would never permit her the divorce she so desperately wanted, and Evan's love for his children made him keep trying, despite what the difficult marriage was doing to them, to all of them.  
  
One day, January 27, 1980 to be precise, Evan staggered out of bed around noon, as was usual for him. He went into the bathroom and flicked on the light and took a look in the mirror; what he saw then was not what he saw every other morning. He saw a man who looked too weak to pick up a fork and eat, which he usually was. His hair was greasy and starting to fall out, his skin was an unnatural orangey color and breaking out everywhere, his teeth hadn't been brushed in days but worst of all were his arms; his arms were littered with scabs, scars, and bright red track lines where veins used to be. For the first time Evan saw what everyone else saw, what his children saw, and he was horrified by it. And he knew then what he had to do.  
  
He waited until later that night, when they were all asleep. Tiptoeing into the children's rooms, he sat by each of their beds and kissed them goodbye without waking them. He told them he loved them, but mostly he used the brief time he had left with them to just stare at them as if to commit them all to memory, which is what he did. Then he walked out of the house and essentially out of his children's lives forever. He occasionally visited or wrote but for the most part, their father was dead to them. Which was part of the reason that Donna had come to find him in the first place.  
  
They didn't speak to each other for a while; Donna needed to get her bearings, and Evan needed to take her in, to see how she'd grown over the years. She had his face, that much was clear, and his coloring. But there was a little bit of her mother peaking out of there as well, at least enough for Evan to notice.  
  
"Why are you here?" Donna asked after a few minutes, daring to look at him.  
  
"Good food mostly," he said, cracking a smile. When he saw her solemn face, he quickly answered, "AIDS. I have AIDS."  
  
"AIDS?" Donna repeated, not believing it. "How.?"  
  
"Needles," he replied frankly. "Too many years on the street, I guess." Donna closed her eyes and looked away, a little sickened by how casual he was when he explained it. "Don't let it bother you, pumpkin, it doesn't bother me that much."  
  
"How can you do this?" she asked him angrily. "How can you talk about.this --- like it doesn't mean anything to you or to me or to anyone else?"  
  
"Because it's my life. It's the justice I get for the life I lived; maybe God's, maybe the Devil's, or maybe someone else entirely. But it is the hand I've been dealt in life and I will play until the end like I always did."  
  
"No matter who else you make fold, right? Just like it's always been with you?" Donna asked contemptuously. Evan cast his eyes downward, unable to deny the truth of that statement to his youngest daughter. She looked back up at him. "How long?" she asked slowly.  
  
"How long what?"  
  
"How long do you have.?"  
  
He shook his head. "Not long," he admitted. "So let's both say what we have to say while we can." He cleared his throat. "How'd you find me anyways?"  
  
"I'm very good at finding information," she told him mysteriously, thinking of all it took to find him. From Chicago she'd gone to the Veteran's affairs office in Madison, knowing if he was collecting off his pension, that's who would have any current address on him. They had a P.O. box in New Orleans, which she'd checked out, only to find he hadn't picked up his mail there for nearly two years. Wandering the city for a few days, she'd gone to every local homeless shelter and clinic she could find until she got lucky; a volunteer who delivered meals for a shelter told her he'd heard from Evan no more than a month ago. He'd been living somewhere in Arizona, but the man wasn't sure where. Also, Evan hadn't sounded good on the phone, according to him. So Donna boarded yet another flight and this time it took her nearly two weeks to track him down to Phoenix Memorial Hospital. Evan had collapsed at a soup kitchen two days prior to her arrival and since the hospital was a charity hospital that took indigent cases, he'd been staying there ever since.  
  
"I see," he replied. "Like your mom."  
  
Donna still felt a pain in her heart whenever she thought of her mother, although she'd grown accustomed to it over the years. But she didn't really want to be compared to her mother now. "Yeah I guess," she said, pulling at her hair a little.  
  
Evan sensed her discomfort and wisely moved on. "So, I gather you have some questions for me and some things to say. That's why you're here now and not at home, with your kids."  
  
That comment surprised her. "How do you know about my kids?"  
  
"Well I didn't completely lose track of you three over the years," he explained. "I still talk to people back home sometimes and I hid under a newspaper occasionally. Your sister is a successful interior decorator, who has been married and divorced; your brother is an acclaimed photographer of wildlife who married the daughter of the former President and they have a son named Shawn; and you," he paused and smiled at her fondly, "you have two little girls named Emma and Natalie, and a husband who's a Senator. You met him when you both worked for the President and the two of you a prominent couple in DC. Did I pass the test?"  
  
"Yeah, that's about it," she said, ducking her head slightly to conceal the pain in her eyes whenever she thought about Josh or the girls, who she missed so much. Her cell phone battery had gone dead two days ago and she hadn't had time to call and check in since, so she had no idea what was going on back home.  
  
"What's wrong?" her father asked, bringing her back.  
  
"No.Nothing," Donna shook him off, hoping he'd let it go but he didn't.  
  
"Something's wrong here, I can see that. What is it?"  
  
She didn't want to admit anything to him, didn't want to let him in that much. But she knew if she wanted to get the answers from him she needed, she would have to tell him. "I left Josh about two months ago, with the girls," she began hesitantly. "Just up and left, like that. And three weeks ago, we were supposed to fly home but at the airport, I started thinking about why I'd left in the first place and I think I figured out why. So I let my girls be taken back home by a friend and I came to find you." She took in a deep breath before continuing. "I think it's because of you. I think you're the reason a lot of things in my life have gone wrong."  
  
She saw him look away and swallow deeply, hints of moisture peering out of his eyelids. Despite everything she was feeling, her natural instinct of guilt took over. She reached over to take his hand but he pulled it away from her with a swiftness that surprised her. "I knew this would happen eventually," he shook his head. "But I always figured it would be T.J., not you."  
  
"What would happen?"  
  
"One of you would find me and hammer the last nail into the coffin," he laughed remorsefully. "Come and show me how much I really failed you all."  
  
Donna weighed her next comment in her head, debating whether or not to say it to spare her father's feelings, but she knew he needed to hear it. "You did fail us," she whispered softly. "You were our father and you abandoned us and you didn't say why."  
  
"You knew why, Donna."  
  
"Not then," she argued. "Not when I needed to. It took years to figure out the real reasons you left. You were a drug addict and you were sick; you could have said you needed to go because you were sick and couldn't be with us. Instead you made us think that you left because you didn't want a family anymore."  
  
"That isn't true!" he shouted as loudly as he could before he began couching violently again. Donna tensed for minute, but then reached over and grabbed a nearby basin for him to cough into. When he was finally through, she handed him a cup of water, which he took a few small sips of before pushing it away. He took a few deep, shuddering breaths before he spoke again. "That's not why I left. How could you possibly think that?"  
  
She leaned back in her chair and stared at the limp flowers on the small table. Saying this, saying something this personal and painful, she couldn't look at him. "The night you left," she finally said, "I woke up when you were in the room, when you said goodbye." Evan crinkled his eyebrows in confusion, thinking back to that night and trying to remember. "I pretended to be asleep so I wouldn't get in trouble for being up late. But then you came into the room and you kneeled beside my bed. You.you stroked my hair," she continued, voice quivering with raw emotion. "And you kissed my head and whispered that you'd always love me and you left. When I heard the front door close, I went up to my window and saw you going down the walkway with a big bag in your hand and I called out for you but you just kept going. So I kept screaming for you and pounding on the glass but you didn't." Donna broke down then and covered her face with her hands, sobbing quietly as the throbbing sense of loss and abandonment that night came back full force. Evan could do nothing but watch his daughter cry, feeling total helplessness seep through him.  
  
"It was cold out," he whispered to himself, drifting back to that night for a moment.  
  
"What?" Donna asked, still crying as she raised her head to look at him.  
  
"It was cold that night when I left," Evan elaborated. "And I put on my heavy jacket and my scarf and my gloves and." he looked at her apologetically, "my ear muffs." She stared at him blankly. "I was wearing ear muffs. I.I couldn't hear you calling for me."  
  
The world shifted off its axis. "Wha.What?" she mumbled. "You couldn't hear me?" He shook his head, regret clear in his eyes. "Oh my God." All of the misconceptions, all of the memories, all of what she knew to be the truth, was really a lie. He hadn't left her behind; he just hadn't been able to hear her that night. The abandonment she'd felt as a child wasn't a cause of her father's indifference but rather a simple yet tragic mistake. It was too much for Donna to be able to grasp. "No," she shook her head vigorously. "No, that can't be true."  
  
"I swear to God, pumpkin, it--" he tried to explain but she would have none of it.  
  
"No!" she cried out, not caring if she disturbed anyone else. "No because see you abandoned us! You abandoned us, you damaged us psychologically, and you didn't care that you did!"  
  
"Donna, I promise you if I had heard you that night I would have come in the house and stayed with you guys no matter what."  
  
"Stop it!" she bawled, getting up and pacing. "Stop saying things like that; you can't think things like that!"  
  
"Why not?"  
  
"Because you can't love us," she told him looking at him accusingly. "Because if you loved us you couldn't have left in the first place! If you really loved us like you always claimed you did, you'd have stayed and been there for us. Instead, you ran away without thinking about it would do for us and became my role model," she finished off sarcastically.  
  
"A role model? What the hell for?"  
  
"For leaving," she said, going over to kneel beside him as her desperation overclouded her anger. "Because, see, I get scared when a situation gets too out of control for me and then I leave like you did and that makes me like you."  
  
"No, you're not," Evan whispered to her gently.  
  
"Yes I am. I have to be," Donna said, tears gliding down her cheeks. "Because I have to be selfish and a free spirit like you. I can't be self- sacrificing and understanding anymore so I have to be like you."  
  
"Why do you have to be that?"  
  
She thought about his words carefully until she said out loud what she hadn't been able to before to anyone. "Because I can't be Mom anymore," she admitted shamefully. "I can't be someone who gives up everything for the people she loves. It takes too much and I.I'm just not as strong she was and I can't--"  
  
"Oh pumpkin," Evan comforted her by placing a withering hand on her cheek. "But you can't be like me either, you know that."  
  
"But I have to be," she tried to convince him, taking his hand. "I have to be like you or like Mom because I've always been one or the other, you or her. And if I can't be like Mom anymore and if I can't be like you then."  
  
"Then you be yourself," Evan told her simply.  
  
"I don't know who that is. I don't know how to try to find it and even if I did, I wouldn't know were to start looking."  
  
"Well what do you want to be?"  
  
She shrugged lightly. "I don't know," she said, feeling very inadequate and small. "You know how most kids either grow up to be like their mom or dad? Well I didn't have you guys growing up and that changed the rules. I had Mena, sure, and she was wonderful but her life made her who she is, I couldn't just be like her."  
  
"No, you're right. Mena is one in a million," he said, giving her a smile.  
  
She smiled back a little bit, feeling calmer now. "Yes she is," Donna agreed. "But don't you get it? My entire life, my identity came from you and Mom. Sometimes I was more like one of you than the other but always like the both of you. And Mom's gone and now you're." She swallowed back some tears. "I just.I need to know who I am and I'm going to be before I can go home again, before I can be a wife and mother again."  
  
"Let me ask you this," Evan replied. "When did you know who you were and what you wanted?"  
  
She paused as she thought back. "You remember my friend Lily, the one from England?" He nodded. "Well I visited with her a while ago and she said that I'm basically the same person I was when I was a kid. Do you think that's true?"  
  
"Do you?"  
  
"When I was a kid, I was such a dreamer," she said, both smiling at the memory. "I knew who I was going to be then. I was going to be this very important person who was going to save everyone I could." Her father started laughing a little. "What's so funny?"  
  
"Nothing I was just remembering something about you," he told her. "You and your sister used to make these collages with your mom. Nicole would just cut anything out of a newspaper or magazine if you let her, but I distinctly remember you'd never let her or anyone cut out the Dear Abbey section of the paper."  
  
"I didn't?"  
  
"No, you didn't, and the reason I remembered it now is because you said she was helping people and when we threw that newspaper out, someone might find it and maybe they would need some help, and Dear Abbey might be able to help them so we shouldn't cut her article all up." He smiled lovingly at her. "You always wanted to help people, for as long as I can remember, but you never knew when to say no. I take it from this mess you're in that hasn't changed all that much."  
  
"No," she shook her head. "You know Lily told me a few weeks ago that she's starting her own magazine and she wants me to write for it."  
  
"Really?" He grinned at her, pride evident in his face. "That's wonderful. What kind of writing?"  
  
"A column but I'm not sure I'm going to do it."  
  
"Why not?"  
  
She thought of how she could explain this too him without sounding too snobbish. "You see with Josh's career, it's better sometimes if when she can be, the wife is just a wife and mother without a job, for public perception. Not all the time but since Josh's mouth can get him trouble sometimes it's better not to draw any unwanted attention."  
  
"He told you this himself? That you shouldn't be working?" Evan asked, a bit perturbed at the son-in-law he'd never met.  
  
"No, he'd never say or expect that, but it's true," Donna said earnestly. "I don't want to do anything that would hurt his career--"  
  
"But you also want the job, don't you? Otherwise you wouldn't be still thinking about it."  
  
"I can't--"  
  
"I'm not asking if you can't. I'm asking if you want to."  
  
Slowly, she nodded her head. "Yes," she admitted. "Yes I want this job very much."  
  
"Then take it," her father advised.  
  
"But--"  
  
"You want to change your life? You want to find out who you really are?" He cut her off passionately. "This is the first step, pumpkin, and you gotta be willing to take it. I know it goes against every instinct you have in your body but you have to do it. You can't go on like this, being this scared and unsure. That's not you; you may not know who you are but I definitely know this isn't you. Please listen to me on this one, Donnatella."  
  
She stared at him attentively. "You think I can do that? Write for a national publication with no experience?"  
  
"You've always been very adaptable," he smiled at her. "You're gonna be just fine, pumpkin. All of you are; I'm not worried about any of you. You're all gonna do great things with your lives, you already have. And I'm very proud of all of you."  
  
"Thank you," she said, touched beyond belief at his words, words she'd secretly longed to hear for many years. Other people might need to hear them as well. "I think I should call Nicole and T.J."  
  
"No," he shook regretfully.  
  
"Why not? Don't you want to see them?"  
  
"The problem is they don't want to see me. Nicole was old enough to remember more than you and T.J. remembers even less. You were the only one I could ever make understand this and I know that you'll make them understand after."  
  
She didn't want to think about that now, about losing him again. They'd just begun mending their relationship and she couldn't imagine him dying right now. Instead she moved on to more happy subjects. "Do you want to see some pictures of your grandchildren?"  
  
His tired eyes danced with delight. "Oh I've been waiting to hear those words for some time."  
  
Donna reached for her purse and pulled out her wallet, rifling through it until she found the pictures. "This one right here," she pointed to the raven-haired boy as she handed him the photo, "is Shawn. He's about a year old now. And this is Natalie here on the right and right here is Emma." She sat back as he saw what his grandchildren looked like for the first time in the pictures that had helped been her lifeline on this trip.  
  
"They are so beautiful," he murmured reverently, tracing the faces that looked back at him. "Natalie; those cheeks are your mother's, definitely. And Emma."  
  
"She's us," Donna told him softly, placing her hand over his on the bed and giving it a gentle squeeze.  
  
The door opened then and an orderly walked in, pushing a tray. "I'm sorry ma'am, visiting hours are over," he said.  
  
"Oh she's not a visitor, Hank," Evan explained. "She's."  
  
"I'm his daughter, Donna," she said, reaching up to shake the man's hand. She turned and gave Evan a small crooked smile.  
  
"Well it's a pleasure to meet you, Donna," Hank replied as he put fresh sheets down on the empty bed next to Evan. "Our man here hasn't had a lot of visitors."  
  
"Well I do now, Hank. And look what she brought with her." He held up the photos. "These are my grandkids. Want to see?" Donna let Evan gush over the pictures for a little while and she let the two men talk as she leaned back into her chair to take a minute for herself, so she could gather her thoughts. She closed her eyes, relaxing back into the chair and feeling herself fall asleep even though she didn't want to. As always happened lately when she had a free moment, her mind wandered to thoughts of Josh and her daughters. She wondered what they were doing then as she drifted off.  
  
What they were doing right then, at least what Josh was doing, was exactly the same thing Donna was. He was resting in an uncomfortable hospital chair, asleep despite a rather stressful day. Only differences were Josh was in a hospital room at GWU and the sun had set quite some time ago.  
  
Hours ago, at the park with an injured Natalie, Ellie had phoned for an ambulance that had arrived swiftly. They'd rushed to GWU, where the ER doctors had taken the baby away from both Ellie and Josh's care to attend to her themselves, stopping in every so often to have forms signed and questions answered. All the family could do was pace around the waiting room with the other worried families of patients and badger the nurses for information. It got so late that Josh had eventually had to send Emma home with Toby and Nicole, who arrived at the hospital quickly after they did. The child went under protest after she'd extracted a promise from her father to call as soon the doctors talked to him. Which turned out to be about an hour later.  
  
"Mr. Lyman?" the doctor had said as he came into the room. Josh immediately stood to greet him and the doctor motioned for him to follow as he walked down a hallway. "We were able to stabilize Natalie, all her vital signs are very good. We determined that the fall caused a moderate concussion, which is tricky with children her age because the brain is still developing and is at risk for serious injury."  
  
"Is she all right?" Josh asked as they walked up two flights of stairs.  
  
"She appears to be," the doctor explained encouragingly. "We stitched up the wound and the initial MRI and CAT scans revealed no significant damage to the brain. She did regain consciousness when we were moving her up here but she fell asleep as soon as the nurses got her settled in." They arrived at the brightly colored corridor of the pediatrics ward and the doctor led Josh to one of the rooms. It was a small, private room with a large hospital crib off to one side and Josh immediately strode over to it. Peering over the bars, he saw his daughter, eyes closed and breathing steadily and he felt his own breathing return to normal for the first time since that afternoon. She was laying on her back in a pair of hospital pajamas decorated with bright sheep, a small IV line attached to one little hand and a large bandage covering the wound on her forehead. Josh was so busy taking her in that he almost didn't hear the doctor continue. "We want to keep her for another day or two to make sure no problems occur, and she'll be scheduled for some more in-depth neurological testing in the next few weeks, just to make sure no swelling develops. But I think she should come out of this just fine."  
  
"Can I stay with her tonight?" Josh asked, not taking his eyes off the child.  
  
"Of course. I'll have one of the nurses show how to unfold the chair out into a bed." He made a quick notation on the chart. "When she wakes up, just ring for the nurse." With that he left Josh alone with his daughter.  
  
That had been about five hours ago and since then Josh had been alternating between fitful sleep and watching Natalie in case she woke up. He'd also made a quick stop to the bathroom and few calls home. Emma had already been sleeping but she woke when Josh called. He promised she could come and see her sister tomorrow and this calmed her down dramatically. A guilty T.J. was also, for once, relieved to hear Josh's voice telling him his niece was all right. The only person he hadn't been able to reach was the person who needed to be here the most and that was Donna. He'd had Nicole call her cell phone dozens of times but the phone was either off or out of service. It frustrated him to no end; their child, their baby girl needed her mother now and she was nowhere to be found. It alternately made him want to lash out in anger and it made him worry that something had now happened to her. His conflicting emotions and his concern for his daughter wore him out and he finally fell into a dead sleep around three am.  
  
"Ouch!" Josh cried out, as he was startled from his sleep by a whack on the head by something. Shaking himself off, he glanced around to see what had hit him when he saw a small stuffed penguin on the floor by his feet. Confused, he noted the sharp pain he felt in his lower back and neck from sleeping in an odd position, and smelling the sterile antiseptic, he suddenly remembered where he was and why he was here. Looking up, he saw the smiling face of his daughter.  
  
"Daddy!" the baby shouted from her crib, standing up and leaning her arms out to her father.  
  
"Hey you," he said getting up and going over to her. "How are you feeling, sweetie?" He leaned down and gave her a kiss on the spot on her forehead not covered with a bandage. Glancing over her face and body, he found her to be no worse for the wear despite the scare she'd given everyone. "You wanna come see Daddy? Okay come on up here." He reached in and gingerly lifted her into his arms, holding her protectively against him, mindful of the IV in her hand. Rocking her gently, he didn't notice when someone else entered.  
  
"Glad to see you're finally awake," a chipper, middle-aged nurse said as she made a note on Natalie's chart.  
  
"Yeah, we're both glad you're awake, Natalie, aren't we?" Josh said to her as she babbled nonsense words to him.  
  
"Oh she's been awake for a couple hours now. I meant you, Dad," the nurse informed him with a smile.  
  
"She's alright?" Josh asked, looking her over again to triple-check.  
  
"She seems just fine. Tough little lady, this one is." She put the clipboard down. "The doctor will be by when rounds start."  
  
As she was leaving, Josh turned back to her, "I'm sorry what time is it?"  
  
"About 7:30 am. Visiting hours start at ten if you're going to have company."  
  
Josh thanked her and turned back to his daughter. "You, young lady," he said seriously as he eased himself into a rocking chair by the window with Natalie, "are never allowed to do anything like this again. Okay?"  
  
"No," she replied sweetly, shaking her head and smiling so Josh had to laugh. She reached up to where the bandage was on her forehead. "Natty got boo-boo?"  
  
"Yes, Natalie got a big boo-boo," Josh told her, lightly touching the bandage. "But it's going to get all better real soon."  
  
"Where Emmy?"  
  
"Emmy is going to come see you later with Aunt Nicole and Toby and Uncle T.J. and Aunt Ellie," Josh said, rocking the balls of his feet for movement as the baby leaned against his chest. "You sleepy? You little a Sleeping Beauty?"  
  
"Yeah," she nodded as her settled on his chest. "Where Mommy? Mommy come too?"  
  
Josh leaned his head back and stared at the ceiling as he rocked and rubbed the baby's back. "I hope so," he whispered to the dozing child, wondering where his wife was at that moment.  
  
Back in Arizona, Donna felt warmth on her face and slowly opened her eyes to find the sun of the early morning shining down on her face from where she sat by the window. Rubbing her eyes and stretching a little in the chair, she turned her head over to the bed where her father was lying.  
  
Without speaking, he turned his head towards her and gave her a bright smile. She smiled back, leaning her head against the window frame. He looked so happy to see her, so peaceful. His eyes were brighter and looked more focused than before. He reached out for her hand and she leaned over to take it. Rubbing his thumb over her knuckles, he continued to smile at her, like he knew something she didn't. Still smiling, she looked down at their joined hands and thought about what had transpired the night before. Old wounds had started to heal and Donna felt like she'd started down a new path in life and while she was scared, she was also excited by the prospect of having her father with her for it. When she looked up to start to tell him all this, he was gone.  
  
His eyes had closed and the gentle blip of the heart monitor that had steadily been going since her arrival had stopped. Looking at his chest, she saw it had stopped moving. Feeling the wrist of the hand she held, she didn't feel a pulse of any kind.  
  
"No," she whimpered, shaking her head in disbelief. "Oh God, no please don't." But seeing his face, she knew it was true. He'd been dying so slowly for so long and he'd waited for the moment when he knew she'd be all right to leave her again. He'd wanted to see her one last time and give her one little bit of hope that would carry her through. But in order to get it he had to leave this Earth. "Oh Daddy," Donna cried as it hit her fully. She put her head down on the bed, still holding his hand, and sobbed at the injustice of it into his now silent chest. 


	7. Chapter Seven

April 12, 2004: Phoenix, Arizona 

"And though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil…" Donna heard the priest drone on, as she stood alone in front of the plain pine box that housed her father's body. The cemetery that would be Evan Moss's final resting place was a small, overcrowded patch of land that the hospital used for patients with no families to be buried. He'd made the arrangements for his funeral service, ironically, the day before Donna had found him. He wanted just two things: to not be given a military funeral, despite being eligible, and to be buried under an oak tree on the far side of the cemetery, somewhat cut off from the other plots. While the hospital had initially denied the special request, with Donna now there and possessing an ample bank account, they'd been obliged to agree.

Now she stood here, as the hospital chaplain finished the brief service, burying the father, all by herself, she'd just found. After he'd died, she was so shell-shocked and tired from both the ordeal and her journey to get here, that she didn't have the heart to phone home to her brother and sister. But thinking about the conversation she'd had with her father before he'd died, and all the years of animosity her siblings felt for their father, she'd thought it was probably for the best. Nicole and T.J. had been able to move on with their lives after Evan, at least better than Donna had. They'd let go of him long before Donna had been able to, and while she knew that all three of them had scars from their father they'd all carry for the rest of their lives, she also knew her scars were the ones that needed the most healing.

"So Heavenly Father," the priest continued as Donna still stared silently, "we send back to you Your son, Evan, so he may rejoice in Your splendor and live in eternity in Your kingdom. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, amen." He quickly crossed himself and closed the worn Bible, stepping back so Donna could have a moment alone.

"Amen," she whispered, still staring vacantly at the coffin. Her long, simple sleeveless beige dress rose slightly as a wind caught it but she ignored the chill. She truthfully didn't know what to do. At her mother's funeral she, her siblings, and Mena, all clad in black, had laid red roses down on Toni's coffin, as did a procession of other loved ones before it was lowered into the ground. Here she was all alone, save a priest and a few graveyard workers, burying a man she'd barely known but whom she had loved so much. There weren't any flowers to leave with him. She didn't even know what she was supposed to say.

"Well," she finally said, stepping closer to the coffin, "I guess this is goodbye. For real this time." Bringing her fingers to her lips, she gently placed them on the coffin. A lone tear that she didn't realize she even had the strength to shed, slid down her cheek. Turning away, she started to walk back towards her rental car when she realized that, yes, there was something she could with him. "Wait," she called back to the workers who had started to lower the coffin into the ground. Jogging back, she reached into her purse and pulled something out. When she got there, she asked one of the workers, "Could you please open the casket?" When they hesitated, she said, "Please. Just for one minute." Grudgingly, one of them opened the heavy lid and revealed Evan's body. He was dressed in a suit that Donna had run out to get for him the day before, and his face had been made up to hide the grayish coloring. If she didn't know better, he could have just been asleep. But he wasn't asleep, he was dead and there was only one thing left that Donna could leave with him. Looking down at the picture, she'd remembered the exact moment she'd found it. She'd been unpacking boxes when she, Josh, and the girls had moved back to DC and in one of the many photo albums her mother had created, there was a lone picture that had struck a cord with Donna, when she'd first begun her exploration of self-doubt. It was a photo of Evan, holding a newborn T.J. in his arms, with Donna and Nicole on either side of him, grinning like fools. The look on Evan's face could be described only as rapture, surrounded by his daughters and holding his family's name bearer. Ever so carefully, Donna slipped the photo under his cold, crossed hands. Glancing up at his face for one last time, she was struck by how even in his death, his face looked so peaceful. "Goodbye Daddy," she whispered tenderly, nodding to the workers once she was done and turning away. She couldn't bear to watch them lower his body into the ground and cover him with moist dirt. So she went back to her car and proceeded to leave the cemetery where she'd left her father, a place she'd probably never visit again.

Looking at the clock, she remembered that she needed to get back to the hospital soon to fill out some final paperwork and collect her father's meager belongings. She arrived there and promptly went up to an administrative office to fill out the remaining paperwork. When that was done, she was led to a small waiting room where the items in question were sitting. The official explained that she'd need to go through them all to make sure nothing was missing from the list that had been taken when Evan had been admitted. Thanking him as he left, Donna turned back to the small cardboard box and opened it slowly. The first few things she pulled out were the filthy pieces of clothing that he'd obviously worn for months. Next came a worn copy of _Arthurian Legends_ that Donna remembered from her childhood. There were some other useless items in the box: a few old toiletries, a dirty flask, and a tin coffee cup covered in rust. The treasures of the homeless, the keepsakes of the unwanted society. When she thought she'd gone through everything, she was about to close up the box when she noticed something peaking out of the corner. Reaching in, she pulled out a beat up looking magazine, which had lost its cover and was badly damaged by weather and time. Flipping through it carefully, she came across an earmarked page and was stunned to discover what she saw.

"A Heart Shaped Oval: A Story of Love and Near-Tragedy in the White House." It was the article that had been written about her in People magazine more than two years ago, when she was recovering from a bout with aplastic anemia back in 2002, just prior to the election. That was when she and Josh had admitted what they really meant to one another and when Emma had come to live with them in Washington. 'He kept it all this time,' she wondered, amazed. Looking at it again for the first time in a while, she saw the familiar pictures of herself sitting on her couch in the apartment she and Josh had first shared with Emma, looking reflectively out the window. A picture of herself and Josh at the President's first Inaugural Ball back in 1998. Another picture with the man who'd saved her life, Dr. Michael Flynn, and his medical team. And finally, a picture she found to be smudged and stained beyond belief, as though someone had looked at it often. It was one of Nicole, T.J., and herself, sitting on her front steps when they were children and another picture next to that of them all as adults.

"Evan looked at that thing all the time," a deep voice startled Donna. Dropping the magazine she looked up into the face of the orderly who had visited with her father the night before he died. He was carrying a jacket and sports bag, looking like he was leaving for the day. "I'm sorry to startle you, ma'am. The name's Hank. Hank Douglas, I work here at the hospital."

"I remember. I'm Donna, it's nice to see you again," she said, reaching over to shake his hand before Hank reached down to pick up the magazine and handed it to her. "Thank you. Please sit down." When he was settled next to her, she asked him curiously, "You seemed to have known my father pretty well for a patient didn't you?"

"Well I knew Evan from way back, we were in the service together," he explained. "We were both just kids over there, real close buddies and all. He saved my life once, when Cambodia was being bombed our company was out on a patrol. I was pretty close to one of the shells but he came and pulled me out. Lost the leg." He lifted up his scrubs to revel a prosthetic leg. "I owed that man my life but after the war we just lost track of each other, like a lot of us did."

"He didn't talk about it a lot, about the war I mean."

"I'd imagine he wouldn't have. It was a rough time for all of us, him more than others I guess." Hank sighed sadly. "I wanted to be there today for the funeral but I couldn't get out of work."

"That's okay," Donna told him. She paused tactfully. "You know why he was…sick, right?"

He nodded soberly. "When he first got here, I didn't even recognize him. It wasn't until I saw his name that I even remembered." He picked nervously at a nail. "I felt so guilty about him. I mean I wasn't using with him back then or anything but I didn't do anything to stop him either so…"

"It wasn't your fault," Donna reassured him. "It was no one's fault but his." She looked down at the magazine and at the faces of her brother and sister. "No one but him."

"I couldn't believe it when he told me what had happened to him. Evan always seemed like he had everything figured out, even with the drugs and all that. He was a good guy." He smiled kindly. "I remember being in the bunker with him when he found out your sister had been born. Man, you'd a thought he was the first guy to ever procreate, he was that proud and happy."

"He was a good father," Donna agreed stonily, "when he was able to be one, which wasn't that often."

Hank looked at her sympathetically. "He loved you three very much. You know that right? He talked about you guys all the time, how horrible he felt about leaving you like that."

"I know he did," she admitted, still looking at the magazine. 

"I think you coming to see him like you did meant a lot to him. He was saying to me the day before he passed that he wanted to apologize to you kids, try to make amends but he just didn't have the guts to call you." Hank reached into his bag and pulled out three envelopes. "So he dictated these letters to me and told me to find you guys and send them out after he died." He held them out for her. "Guess I don't need to do that anymore."

She slowly reached out and took the white manila envelopes in her hands, holding them as if they were precious stones, the names of either herself or her siblings on the envelopes that contained the posthumous words of their father. "Thank you," she said to Hank. 

"Anytime." He reached over and squeezed her shoulder. "You take care of yourself now. And if you ever need anything, you give old Hank Douglas a call you hear? I owe your father at least that much."

"I will," she replied as she started to gather her things.

"Do you need a lift to a hotel or the airport?" he asked cordially.

"No, I've got a car here but thanks," she said getting up and starting to leave. When she reached the doorway, she turned back to Hank who was walking out the opposite door. "And Hank?" He turned around and she smiled at him. "Thank you for being a friend to him. I know he needed one." He nodded at her silently before they both parted ways again, perhaps forever, perhaps not.

When Donna got back to her hotel, the sun was beginning to set in the sky. 'I bet the girls are getting ready for bed,' she thought wistfully. It had been nearly three days since she'd last talked to them and her heart was aching to speak with them and with Josh, whom she hadn't spoken to in weeks. But after burying her father and coming to some realizations of her own, it made her acknowledge how much she wanted her family back. Going into the bathroom, she set her phone in the charger so she could check her messages and call home again.

In the meantime, she went about showering and changing into her pajamas, not planning on going anywhere that night. When she was done, seeing that her phone wasn't ready yet, she glanced over at the side table and saw the letters sitting there. Debating for a moment whether or not she wanted to put herself through the task of reading the words at that moment, she decided that it was probably best to get it over with now. Taking the envelope, she walked back to her bed and laid down over the comforter. Delicately breaking the seal, she slowly pulled out the typed manuscript and began to read:

            _My Dearest Donnatella,_

_I know you're probably wondering why your old man chose now to write to you and I'll get the hard part out of the way first: I'm dying, at least I am at this moment but when you get this letter, I'll already be gone. I'm sorry we'll never get the chance to patch up our differences or say a tearful goodbye but we both know I was never very good at those._

_There were so many things, though, that I wanted to say to you before I died. I guess the biggest one was that I loved you and Nicole and T.J. very much. It's hard to believe, I know but it's true. You three were the greatest things I ever did with my life and I thanked the Lord everyday for allowing me the time I had with you._

_Which brings us to a cold January night twenty-five years ago. I don't think you remember but I said goodbye to each of you when you were asleep that night. I didn't want to leave any of you; you have to believe that I didn't. I just couldn't make you three watch me kill myself the way I was and eventually did. It wasn't an easy decision, Donna. I loved you all very, very much, your mother included. She was an amazing woman who didn't deserve what I gave her in life but despite it all, I never stopped loving her, not a single day._

_But now back to you, pumpkin. I've read articles about how you were sick; I wanted to come out then but I figured I wouldn't be welcome, at least by your grandmother anyway. I'm so relieved to know that you're doing better. And that you have a family of your own now, whom I'm sure you love with everything your worth just the way your mother did with you kids. I wish I could have met them and your husband but like I always said, you've got to play the hand your dealt._

_So that's all I have to say. Live a happy life surrounded by family and friends; Don't be afraid to ask for help once in awhile; Trust that you know what is right for yourself; and most of all, just be good. Be good in life to everyone you meet, no matter what they do to you. Be good to your husband in the ups and downs of marriage, because there will be many of them. Be good to yourself, Donnatella. Just be good, not that you'll have a problem with that. You have quite possibly the purest heart of any person I've ever known. Please, I pray to you, never lose it for any reason._

_I love you pumpkin,_

_Evan Moss [Daddy]_

Folding the letter back up, Donna walked swiftly over to the second-hand laptop she'd purchased in Chicago and sat in front of it. When the computer turned on, she opened up the Word program and began typing furiously. For hours, she sat there and typed, not stopping for food or drink or bathroom breaks or sleep or anything. She just kept typing like a woman possessed by something deep inside her. Finally, as the sun began to rise and the sky became the color of pink lemonade, she was finished. Without even bothering to get dressed, she hurried over to the local library, printing out several copies of her work. From there, she went to the post office and mailed out several overnight delivery packages, not caring about the expensive service charge. At around noon, she arrived back at the motel and promptly collapsed onto the bed, emotionally and physically exhausted, and slept through the rest of the day and night, allowing her body to start to heal. 

The next morning, as she was preparing to check out, she pulled out her cell phone and checked her voicemail. There were a couple of messages from the girls that made her smile brightly. But then the third message was one from her sister, speaking hurriedly and frantically. "Donna, it's Nicole. Look you need to come home right now, Natalie just took a really bad fall and she's in the hospital with head injury. Where the hell is…?" Donna didn't hear the rest of the message, she dropped the phone on the ground and threw several twenty-dollar bills on the counter before she ran out of the motel and made a beeline for her car, racing towards the airport without even stopping for red lights.

Later that day, back in DC, Josh was in his office with his staff, mapping out a strategy for the coming months concerning an environmental bill. "Now it's important to remember," Josh explained as he paced slowly around the conference room, "that this is a critical bill that needs to pass the Senate. The House passed this bill a month ago and it's going to come out of committee any day now. I want to know more about this bill than any other Senator out there. The more we understand the legislation, the more we can control it and make it work for…"

"Ourselves so we can campaign heavily on it, right?" A snotty little aide who also happened to be the son of a ranking member on the Budget committee, piped in.

Josh, and everyone else in the room for that matter, rolled their eyes at the young man. "I was going to say, make it work for the millions of children it's going to affect in the coming years but hey, whatever gets you to do the work. Anything else?" Everyone shook their heads no. "Alright, you guys can take off but I want you here by 7:00am, researching the stats on respiratory illnesses. Thank you."

"Thank you, Senator," they replied as the filed out of the room. Toby hung back to talk to him. 

"How's Natalie doing?" he asked.

"She's good, thanks," Josh replied, relief clear in his voice over the fact that the baby was spending her first day back at home without any problems. "I checked in with the babysitter around lunch and she seemed fine."

"Good. Listen do you want Nic and me to take the girls for a night this week? Give you some time for yourself?"

"No that's fine."

"It wouldn't be a problem for us."

"It would be for me," Josh said giving him a small grin. "But thanks for offering. You heading home?"

"Yeah, what about you?"

"I've got to do messages real quick. Say hi to Nicole for me."

"Have a good night, Senator." Toby left the room then and after Josh got his papers together, he walked back out through the outer office until he saw Gus.

 "Hey, what are you still doing here? I told you to take off like an hour ago." He noticed then the worried look on Gus's face. "Is everything okay?" He didn't answer Josh. "Gus, did something happen?"

Gus finally looked up at Josh's face. "This…this came for you by messenger a few minutes ago," he explained gradually. He held out a yellow business envelope, with express mail postage on it, to Josh. 

"What is it?" Josh asked, reaching for it.

"It's from Donna," Gus told him gently. Josh shot his head up and looked at the young man, shock evident in his face. "The handwriting is hers but I didn't recognize the address." He eyed his boss with deep concern. "Do you want me to open it or…?"

"Uh no, that's…that's okay, Gus," Josh managed to get out. He cleared his throat nervously as he looked over the package. It wasn't that thick, so thankfully it wasn't divorce papers, but he didn't know what she'd send him that she couldn't explain over the phone.  "Listen you can head home. I'll just open this here."

"I can stay, Josh, it's not a big deal," Gus said quickly.

"No, no go home. I'll be alright."

"Are you sure? Maybe you'll want someone later…?"

"Gus I appreciate your concern, I really do. But I'm not your buddy in this office; I'm your boss. And I just told you to do something, so I suggest you do it now," Josh said sternly.

"Yes sir," Gus replied, knowing that Josh's response came more from anxiety than anger. "I'll be here early tomorrow, if you need anything." He put his coat on and prepared to leave. "Goodnight sir."

"Thank you. Goodnight." Josh hadn't taken his eyes off the package throughout that entire exchange. Taking a deep breath, he slowly headed back into his office.  Dropping his briefcase, he sat down beside his desk and stared at the envelope for a long while until his curiosity finally compelled him to open the package. Peering inside it, he saw what appeared to be several typed pages of text, so he lifted them out and began to read them by the light of his desk lamp:

Do What You Have to Do By Donna Lyman 

_About four months ago, I came to understand something about myself: I didn't know who the hell I was or what I was doing with my life. The only thing I knew was that I wasn't happy and there was no earthly reason for it. I had two beautiful homes, two daughters who are the joys of my life, and a husband that I adored and who adored me back. I should have been soaring high on Cloud Nine but I wasn't and I finally figured out why. You'd think it would be something very clinical and complicated but it was that age-old problem that haunts us all every now and then: Daddy didn't love me._

_            To understand this better, I have to give you all a little background information: My father was a drug addict who loved me and my brother and sister very much but was never able to be a true father to us. He was kind, intelligent, gentle, and incredibly handsome back in the day. You'll notice in describing my father, I'm using the past tense. That's because this morning, I buried my father. I buried him in a cemetery in Arizona I'll probably never see again, all alone save a priest and three graveyard workers hoping to make it out of there by lunch. His addictions killed him physically that day but his addictions had killed him for my family and I long ago…_

Josh read the prose with rapt attention, eyes never straying from the pages, as this communication from his wife captivated him completely. Time did not exist then nor did appetite or fatigue; all that mattered were these words that Donna had poured her heart into…

_            Growing up, I knew I was different from almost everybody else around me. Maybe it was because I had money or that I was a geek and a cheerleader at the same time or maybe it was because I was orphaned years before I was ready to be. When my mother died, I didn't know how I would bear it. The pain and sorrow consumed me in a way I'd never felt before nor have I felt since. But did I reach out to let anyone help me? Did I find a way to vent my emotions healthily? Did I cry and cry until I couldn't cry anymore? No, I just went and did what I always did: I put everyone else's feelings above my own and took care of them instead of myself. Smart move, Donna, smart move… _

Across town, alone in her apartment, a teary-eyed Nicole was pacing carefully through the apartment, drinking her second glass of white wine while reading her sister's work. The first letter she got that day had been from the ghost of her father while the second one was from the ghost Donna had become but would hopefully be no more. 'Looks like she found her answers after all,' Nicole thought thankfully, continuing to read…

            _When I entered college, I vowed this would be a new beginning for me. I was going to be independent and an individual for the first time in my life. But then came The Boyfriend, who shall remain nameless. The Boyfriend that put me on a pedestal and made me feel like a queen. For about five minutes before he needed a check to cover tuition payments. The years that I spent with The Boyfriend were some of the most turbulent and self-loathing periods of my life. Only one good thing came out of that mess and I get to kiss her goodnight after I tuck her into bed…_

Smiling slightly, T.J. looked at his son, who was playing quietly at his feet. When he'd seen the letter from his father, he'd been angry at first for not being able to tell the bastard off before he died. But after re-reading it and Donna's work, he felt his anger progressively convert into the sorrow one feels when they lose a parent. Getting down on the floor with Shawn, T.J. sat by him and hugged him close as he kept reading…

            _The first time I saw my husband, I knew this wasn't going to end well. First, he was already seeing someone. Second, we were working round-the-clock jobs, and third, he was my boss! This had "Cheryl Ladd TV Movie of the Week" written all over it. I mean, I loved him so much I had to quit my job one time because I couldn't stand being near him and not being able to tell him that. Of course, I soon discovered that I also couldn't stand to be away from him either and that didn't work out too great. So I went back and pined away for four agonizing years but eventually, I did get my man. And how you might ask? Let me let you ladies in on a little secret: You want a guy to realize he's head-over-heels for you? Almost die on him and see what happens…_

Mena suppressed a chuckle at that one; her granddaughter using her wit to smooth over what had been a terribly trying situation for all of them. But Mena had never realized before how many trying situations Donna had faced in her young life, how little she'd really helped her sweet Bella. Yet Donna possessed within her a strength, which she herself could not always understand. But maybe now, she was starting to as the words Mena read showed…

            _So now I bring you back with me to that day, five months ago. I was sitting in my house that had just finished being unpacked, in the kitchen around noontime when I realized something: I didn't have anything to do. Not a_ _job to go to, a friend to visit, a place to go to. I had nothing. I had a daughter at school, who's probably going to be graduating college by the time she's twenty, and a toddler asleep upstairs, who'd be leaving me just as quickly or so I thought. We had money so I didn't need_ _work but I wanted to. I wanted that fulfillment that I had found in working. What I didn't have was a college degree but how could I go for that and be the wife and mother I thought I needed to be? Suddenly before I knew it, I was trapped. I wanted to work but I felt I couldn't if I wanted to be a good wife and mother. But if I wasn't happy, like I wasn't without working, how could I be a good wife and mother? All of these questions and emotions weighed down on me like an anchor until I couldn't take it anymore and I just snapped!_

_            I'm not going to tell you what the last few months were like because that's something that only my family and I need know. But just know this: I did what I had to do. I'm not proud of it or happy that I did but I needed to do it. I needed to find myself again. I don't know if I'm quite there yet or when I will be but at least I know now that I'm going to get there. Eventually._

**The End**

Putting down the manuscript, Lily looked around the vacant offices of her Manhattan workspace that she had just bought. There was no furniture in any of the rooms, just a phone sitting on the floor beside Lily. But glancing around the area, she could almost see and hear the activity this place would one day create. She couldn't wait to get her dream started. And now, it looked like she wouldn't be dreaming it alone.

An hour later, at around 9:30, Josh stumbled through the door of his house. He was tired from work, from Donna's letter, just from life in general. As corny as it seemed, the days were longer when Donna wasn't with him. Was he still mad at her? Yes. Did he not trust as much as used to? Yes. But did he still love her? Absolutely and if the essay or whatever it was that he'd gotten tonight was any indication, she still loved him too. So he had hope but not his wife.

"Kerry?" he called out to the babysitter he'd used that night. She was highly recommended by the service he used and the girls seemed to like her. After he'd gotten caught in some traffic, he'd called home and left her a message on the machine to put Emma to bed, figuring she was helping her with her bath. "Kerry? Are you asleep?" he asked again, shrugging out of his coat.

"I sent her home," a voice surprised him from behind. Not believing his ears, he turned slowly and for the first time in more than two months, came face to face with his wife. "Hi."

"Hi," he mumbled as he gazed at Donna for the first time in so long. She looked as beautiful as he remembered, perhaps even more so because it had been so long since he'd seen her. But there was also a distinct tiredness in her eyes that hadn't been there before this whole mess began. There was so much he wanted to say but no way to say it, so he started with a simpler question. "Where are the girls?"

"They're asleep," she told him. She smiled to herself. "It felt so good giving them a goodnight kiss again, you have no idea."

"I think I probably do," he reminded her, turning away from her and taking his coat off. 

Donna chose not to respond to that comment. "I was just having a beer in the kitchen. You want to join me?"

"You're offering me alcohol? This is either an olive branch or a sign of the coming Apocalypse," he cracked, walking past her into the kitchen. 

"Well, you look like you could use one," she added as she joined him, sitting down on a stool as Josh went to grab his beverage. As she was lifting her own bottle to her lips, Josh noticed something on her hand, or rather didn't notice something.

Mentally questioning whether or not he really wanted to know the answer, he realized he'd get it one or another tonight so he might as well just get it out of the way early. "Where's your ring?" he simply asked, staring pointedly at her left hand.

Donna slowly lowered the bottle from her mouth to the table and looked Josh straight in his eye. Reaching behind her neck, she undid a small silver chain that was around her neck. When she took the necklace off and held it in front of him, he saw that her blouse had hidden her wedding and engagements rings. "I put them on a chain a couple of weeks ago because I was afraid I'd lose them. Do you still wear yours?"

He held up his left hand and wiggled the ring finger. "Never took them off," he replied, raising his eyebrows. "Why would you think I would?"

She shrugged noncommittally. "I don't know. Just curious I guess."

"Why did you take yours off?" he asked, trying to mask his anxiousness with a calm face.

Instead of looking at her husband, she looked at the beer bottle she was twirling between her fingers. "I just…" she started to say, "I just thought I wasn't acting much like your wife and I shouldn't be wearing them with the way I treated you."   

"Okay," Josh nodded before they fell back into silence. They just sat across from one another, drinking their beers slowly, as their entire future hung in the balance of this conversation. But they were both too scared of what would happen if they did continue it. And trapped by this fear, they tried to skate around the issue for as long as possible.

"So has anything interesting happened with work?" Donna tried to ask casually but her nervous twisting of her hair gave her away.

"Just…the usual," Josh replied, a little thrown by her rapid change of topics. 

"Did the Electronic Education bill ever get out off committee?" she asked politely.

"Yes but the Majority Leader had it killed it when it got to the Floor. Can we not talk about my work right now?"

"Fine," she agreed in a resigned tone. "What do you want talk about?"

He sighed in frustration. "You know what I want to talk about, Donna. You know what we need to talk about right?"

"If this marriage is worth saving or not?" she asked frankly, still not meeting his eyes.

He looked away from her. "Be blunt about it, why don't you?"

"I was just saying what we've both been thinking for weeks now," Donna told him. "And don't try to tell me that you haven't thought about it either because I know you; you've thought every possible scenario through three times over. And that is one of them."

"So you're saying that you just want to give up?" he asked, trying to be cool but inside dreading that his fears would be confirmed. "You want end us right here and now? You want to tear this family apart?"

"No I don't," she disagreed strongly. "But if that's only reason you want to stay married, for the girls' sake, then we don't need to have this argument right now. We can't stay married just because you think it's what's best for the girls."

"Since when are you concerned with what's best for the girls?" he spat out, feeling himself lose control like he did that night she left. Without waiting for her to react, he immediately apologized. "I'm sorry, Donna, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that." He wiped his hands over his eyes to calm down before he looked at her and at the sympathetic look she was giving him.

"Is it the PSTD?" she asked knowingly.

He kept staring at her, surprised. "How'd you know? Did you talk to Toby or…?"

"No," she answered. "I figured out after awhile for you to go off the way you did that night…that wasn't you so I knew it had to be something else." She looked at him concerned. "Did you get help?"

He nodded. "I called Stanley Keyworth. He came out here and we talked about it. He's got me on an anti-depressant that seems to work pretty well so far."

"That's good," Donna said, smiling a little but it quickly faded away. "But you were right before. When I left, I wasn't thinking about what was best for the girls. I…I just wanted them with me so badly, I didn't think I'd be able to get through it without them."

"Is that the only reason?" he asked suspiciously.

She took a swig of beer. "No," she said hesitantly when she swallowed. "A small part of me, a very microscopic part of me, wanted to hurt you in some way."

"Well," he said with a raise of his eyebrows and a hurt chuckle, "you did."

"And I'm sorry I did," she apologized passionately. "It was horribly selfish of me to put you through that, especially with PTSD and all. I regret taking them with me for what it did to you."

"But you don't regret leaving?"

"No I don't."

"Because you did what you had to do?"

She looked at him hopefully. "You got my article."

"That's what it was? An article?"

"Yeah." She paused for a minute. "So what did you think of it?" chewing her bottom lip, hoping for his approval despite knowing she didn't need it anymore.

"It was," Josh tried to find the right word, "insightful. Very insightful and well written." He tapped his finger on the tabletop tensely. "I'm sorry about your dad," he finally said.

"Thank you," she answered, hanging her head low. "That's…that's why I didn't get the message about Natalie. My phone wasn't charged up until today and I got on the first plane back." She looked deep into his eyes. "You have to know I would have come back if I had known. I would have run from Arizona to the hospital if I knew she'd been hurt," she said emphatically, her voice catching slightly at the end. 

"I know you would have," Josh agreed whole-heartedly. "But she's okay now. The doctors said everything checked out." Donna nodded, her mind eased but not her guilt. "Besides," he continued, "it sounded from the article like you and your dad needed that time together."

"We did," she concurred. "We didn't have much of it but we did good with the time we had."

"How did he die?"

"AIDS. He was an addict until the end but he was still my father." She fiddled with the now empty bottle of beer. "We talked about a lot of things while he was alive. We made our peace with each other after all these years."

"That's good," he said, genuinely happy for her. He finished his beer. "So why didn't you just call or come home?"

"What do you mean?"

"You could have said everything out loud that you said in that article. Why did you go through the trouble of sending it to me?"

"I didn't just send it to you," she explained. "I sent copies to Nic and T.J. and Mena and Lily and you. I need to just have a stream of conscious so I could get everything out for myself and I needed to write it down because I think it could help other people."

"Other people? You mean your family?"

"Did you and Lily talk a lot when she brought the girls back?" Donna inquired, scrunching her eyebrows in confusion.

Josh shook his head. "We didn't really have time to. She had to catch a flight back to England the next morning. Why?"

"Lily's starting a magazine and she wants me to write for it as a columnist." She shrugged and smiled. "And I'm going to."

"Really?" Josh asked, a bit intrigued.

"Yeah," she said shyly. Then she grew nervous. "Why? Do you not think I'd be good enough to--?"

"No, no, of course not," Josh corrected her hastily. "Based on that article, I'd think you'd do great. I just never knew writing was something you wanted to do, that's all."

She nodded slowly. "There's still a lot about me you don't know, Josh," she said seriously. "But that's not entirely your fault because there's a lot I don't know about myself either. What I do know is that I want this job; I want it very much and I'm going to do it the only way I know how."

"How's that?"

"By being honest, completely honest, with the people who read it. I learned the hard way that's the only way I can be happy."

Josh watched her intensely, his interest peaked. "What else do you want?"

She met his gaze with the same intensity. "I want us to work," she answered softly. "I want us to be a family again, with you and the girls, because I want to be, not because it's what right. I want us to be better than we were before because if we had to go through that again, we wouldn't make it." She averted her eyes. "I want you to love the person that I'm going to become and not the person that you first knew me as. Because she's gone and I can't be her again: I don't want to be her again."

Josh took in this admission silently and waited a minute before he responded. "Here's what I want," he began. "I want to not be angry at you anymore. I want to be able to fully trust you again. I want to be able to trust myself. I want our daughters to always feel secure and safe with us. I want things to be the way they were when--"

"That can't be, Josh," Donna shook her head vehemently. "They can never be that way again--"

"When you were happy," he cut her off. "I want you to be happy because that's when I'm happy too." 

Donna looked at him surprised and hopeful. "You…you want to try again to make us work?" she asked with a hint of trepidation.

Josh didn't answer her, just reached over and took her wedding rings off the chain and into his hand. "It'll be hard," he said as he rolled the rings between in his fingers, "it'll be messy and complicated and one or both of us will probably want to quit at some point." He took her left hand in his own, the first physical contact they'd had in months. Donna felt her heart racing anxiously as she watched him take the rings and place them back on her ring finger. He looked back up at her, smiling for the first time. "But I love you and no matter what happens, that will never change. Back during the first campaign, you weren't the only who was miserable when you left and this time…" He didn't need to describe the pain he felt this time around because he knew she had felt it too. He gently squeezed her hand, feeling comfort from the cool metal of her ring against his skin and she with his. "I don't want to lose you again."

She smiled contently at him for the first time in a long while. "I love you too," she whispered lovingly. "And we're going to make this work, I promise."

So they just sat there for the rest of the night, talking and laughing, sometimes arguing jokingly about stupid things but never with the ferocity that had tore them apart in the first place. They didn't make any decisions or plans or agreements. They didn't discuss the future or the past or the present; they didn't make any more promises to each other. But they both had something they hadn't had in ages: they had hope, they had peace, and they had each other.

The End [Until next time, that is!]


End file.
